The website of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) went offline on Saturday at a time when President Donald Trump has frozen foreign aid and other developments.
The freeze has also caused shutdown of services and layoff of thousands since Trump’s declaration during his swearing in and subsequent executive orders.
Democrats have however accused Trump’s administration of planning to end USAID as an independent agency and instead absorb it into a state agency. They continued by accusing Trump that he has no legal capacity to end operations of an independent agency.
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According to Trump and the congressional Republicans. foreign aid and development programs are wasteful as they called on polices that advance social agenda’s.
The U.S stands as the largest donor to USAID contributing 1% of its budget to the agency and surpassing other countries by far.
Founded by President John F. Kennedy, USAID was to counter soviet influence at the height of the cold war before it was enacted by congress in 1961. Recently it has been at the center of challenges for U.S amid growing influence of China who developed foreign programs of its own.
