President Donald Trump’s blanket freeze on foreign aid programs has reportedly been halted by a federal judge who slammed the administration’s failure to adequately weigh the devastation its effects could have on hundreds of businesses and nonprofits across the country.
In an order released Thursday, U.S. District Judge Amir Ali, a Biden appointee, ruled that the 90-day blanket freeze issued by executive order as Trump returned to the White House last month was an illegal overreach of his power, Politico reported.
The Washington D.C.-based federal judge ordered Trump to reinstate funding for the foreign aid contractors, many of which have had to cut programs, trim employees or cease operations altogether because of the sudden freeze, according to the publication.
“At least to date, Defendants have not offered any explanation for why a blanket suspension of all congressionally appropriated foreign aid, which set off a shockwave and upended reliance interests for thousands of agreements with businesses, nonprofits, and organizations around the country, was a rational precursor to reviewing programs,” Ali wrote in the 15-page order.
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“Absent temporary injunctive relief, therefore, the scale of the enormous harm that has already occurred will almost certainly increase,” the judge added.
Ali seemed to acknowledge the chaos and uncertainty swirling around the freeze, which reportedly shocked State Department officials and sent organizations scrambling to figure out what their next move would be.
His order also prohibited senior State Department and budget officials – including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought – from enforcing any “contract cancelations or stop-work orders” established after Trump took office.
“There is nothing arbitrary and capricious about executive agencies conducting a review of programs,” Ali said in his ruling. “But there has been no explanation offered … as to why reviewing programs — many longstanding and taking place pursuant to contractual terms — required an immediate and wholesale suspension of appropriated foreign aid.”
The Trump administration was ordered to file a report with the court by Tuesday informing the judge of the status of their compliance.