Trump DOJ Asks Supreme Court to Approve Foreign Aid Freeze (1)

The Trump administration has asked the US Supreme Court to let officials block billions of dollars in foreign assistance funds approved by Congress for the year.

The Justice Department on Tuesday announced it had filed a request for the justices to provide immediate clarity on whether the government can refuse to spend the contested foreign aid, citing fast-approaching deadlines for agencies to commit to spending plans before the fiscal year ends on Sept. 30.

The administration won the latest round of the funding fight before a federal appeals court earlier this month, but that ruling hasn’t taken effect yet. In the meantime, the State Department and the US Agency for International Development are still bound by a Washington district judge’s order that they use all of the money lawmakers voted to spend.

Read More: Foreign Aid Groups Challenge Loss in Trump Funding Freeze

The Justice Department says it needs a decision by Sept. 2 to have enough time to develop spending plans, negotiate with foreign governments or international organizations poised to receive US dollars, and notify Congress before some of the funds expire on Sept. 30. The uncertainty in the days since the appeals court ruled had “exacerbated” the “destabilizing consequences” of the original injunction, US Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote.

The groups that sued say that more than $15 billion of the approximately $30 billion that lawmakers voted to approve for foreign assistance programs in a 2024 spending bill is set to expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The government said in its brief that the figure was approximately $12 billion.

In an Aug. 13 ruling, a 2-1 panel of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit sided with the administration and reversed the lower court judge. The majority found that nonprofits and businesses lacked valid legal grounds to sue over the Trump administration’s decision to withhold the funds, also known as impoundment.

The challengers asked all of the DC Circuit’s active judges to reconsider that decision. The appeals court has a majority of liberal-leaning judges appointed by Democratic presidents but the panel’s majority featured two of the court’s more conservative members: Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson, appointed by former President George H.W. Bush, and Judge Greg Katsas, nominated by President Donald Trump. Judge Florence Pan, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, dissented.

The administration’s foreign aid freeze “has deprived the most vulnerable people in the world of humanitarian assistance, leading to mass death, impoverishment, sickness, and waste,” the challengers said in their brief. They argued that the DC Circuit’s decision was “a transformation in constitutional law” that would prevent any private party from going to court to enforce Congress’ power over federal spending.

The Justice Department countered that the panel had rightly concluded that any disputes between the legislative and executive branches over congressionally appropriated funds should “be resolved between the political branches rather than at the behest of private parties.”

The case is Trump v. Global Health Council, 25A227, US Supreme Court.

(Updated with additional information from the application.)

To contact the reporter on this story:
Zoe Tillman in Washington at ztillman2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net

Elizabeth Wasserman, Peter Blumberg

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