Trump Fires USAID Inspector General After Warning On Funding Oversight

The White House fired the inspector general of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), officials said, just one day after his office warned that the Trump administration’s dismantling of USAID had made it nearly impossible to monitor $8.2 billion in unspent humanitarian funds, Ellen Knickmeyer reported for the Associated Press (AP).

The administration’s abrupt foreign aid freeze is also forcing mass layoffs among U.S. suppliers and contractors for USAID. I Photo: USAID X

The White House gave no reason for the dismissal of Inspector General Paul Martin. Inspectors general are typically independent, congressionally funded watchdogs assigned to government agencies to root out waste, fraud, and abuse.

The Trump administration has already purged more than a dozen inspectors general.

Martin’s office issued a flash report warning that the administration’s freeze on all foreign assistance, along with efforts to cut USAID staff, had left oversight of humanitarian aid “largely nonoperational.”

The report also stated that these actions had severely hindered the agency’s ability to ensure that no funds were being diverted to violent extremist groups or lost in conflict zones.

Trump terminated contracts without the required 30-day notice and without making back payments for work already completed.

The firing, first reported by CNN, is the latest move by the Trump administration to weaken USAID, including efforts to pull nearly all its staffers worldwide off the job. Trump and ally Elon Musk have argued that the agency’s work does not align with the president’s agenda.

A lawsuit filed recently alleges that the dismantling of USAID is depriving American businesses of hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid bills for completed work.

The administration’s abrupt foreign aid freeze is also forcing mass layoffs among U.S. suppliers and contractors for USAID, including 750 furloughs at one company, Washington-based Chemonics International, according to the lawsuit.

The move amounts to "stiffing the contractors," something Trump was frequently accused of doing at the Trump Organization.