On Thursday, a U.S. Judge ordered that the Trump Administration pay at least some of the almost $2 billion owed in foreign aid for projects completed previously by Monday 6 pm. This was a swift ruling, which came just one day after the Supreme Court denied the Trump administration’s request to extend its freeze.
After a four-hour hearing on Thursday, U.S. district court judge Amir Ali made his decision. He questioned both sides about their repayment plans and the time frame for the government’s compliance with the $1.9 billion of owed foreign assistance that was completed.
The judge ordered the government to pay a minimum of $1.9 billion on Monday, 6 pm.
“I think it’s reasonable to get the plaintiffs’ invoices paid by 6 p.m. on Monday,” said Judge Ali. “What I’ll order today is the first concrete step that plaintiffs have their invoices paid … [and] work completed before Feb. 13 to be paid by 6 p.m. on Monday, March 10th.”
The order had previously given the Trump Administration until Feb. 26, 11:59 pm, to settle its debts to foreign aid organizations.
The Justice Department argued the deadline was “impossible”. Judge Ali appeared to reject this notion during Thursday’s court hearing.
An attorney from the Justice Department requested more time for payments due to the difficulty in getting transactions approved over the weekend. As a response, Ali pointed out that more than 70 million dollars had been paid by the government between the hours of Wednesday night and the morning of Thursday. He noted that it “ought” to be possible for this as well.
Judge Ali stressed at the hearing on Thursday that the deadline of February 26 he had previously given the government for payment of the $1.9 billion in foreign aid has passed.
He said that the Supreme Court has given him the task of clarifying the role played by the government in the repayment process. These are instructions he takes “very, very seriously”.
The 5-4 Supreme Court decision one day earlier remanded the case back to the D.C. federal court, and Judge Ali, o hash out the specifics of what must be paid, and when. Judge Ali moved quickly following the high court’s decision, ordering both parties back to court Thursday to weigh plausible repayment schedules.
The early morning hours of the hearing on Thursday focused on the role of the government and the review of foreign aid grants and contractors, for which Trump Administration lawyers informed Judge Ali that they have already finished and finalized the reviews.
Stephen Wirth, an attorney for the plaintiffs, objected to the “breakneck review” of contracts and grants by the Administration, saying that it “had only one goal–to terminate as many contracts possible.”
The lawyers were asked if the Trump Administration can terminate projects for which funds have been allocated by Congress.
The Supreme Court could decide the case.
The case concerned how fast the Trump Administration needed to pay nearly $2 billion in debts owed by aid groups to contractors for projects completed with funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development. This was at a moment when the Trump administration had issued a blanket ban on foreign spending, in an effort to “improve government efficiency” and eliminate waste.
President Donald Trump announced plans to reduce some 90 percent of USAID contracts for foreign aid and to cut an additional 60 billion dollars in foreign aid expenditures.
The acting U.S. Sarah Harris, the Solicitor-General of the United States said the claims made by the plaintiffs were “legitimate,” but that the deadline Judge Ali set for them to settle the unpaid invoices “was not logistically nor technically feasible.”
Plaintiffs have claimed that the lower-court judge ordered Trump’s administration to begin to pay the foreign aid owed more than two weeks ago. They said that the government failed to comply with the deadline and even took steps not to do so. This indicated that Trump had no intention of fulfilling this request.