A new report says that the U.S. Agency for International Development, also known as USAID, shut down its headquarters to personnel on Monday after moves made by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is currently being led by Elon Musk.
An email was blasted out to personnel for the agency saying the move was taken by “Agency leadership.” It then informed personnel that any and all replies should be sent to an email address that is connected with Gavin Kliger, who serves as the special adviser to the director of the Office of Personnel Management and who also is part of DOGE, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Early on Monday, Musk stated that President Donald Trump “agreed” to close shop on USAID, which distributes billions of dollars in alleged humanitarian, development, and security assistance to over 100 countries.
“None of this could be done without the full support of the President, you know. And with regard to the USAID stuff, I went over it with him in detail, and he agreed that we should shut it down,” Musk went on to say in an X Spaces discussion.
“And I actually checked with him a few times. I said, ‘Are you sure?’ He’s like, ‘Yes,’” the owner of social media platform X continued. “So we’re shutting it down.”
Musk later stated in the conversation, which also featured former DOGE co-leader Vivek Ramaswamy and Iowa Republican Sen. Joni Ernst, that there was essentially little to no hope of ever being able to reform and improve USAID, so instead, they were going to shut it down.
“So to be clear, in shutting down, which we’re in the process of doing, shutting down USAID, the reason for that, as opposed to simply trying to do some minor house cleaning, is that, as we dug into USAID, it became apparent that what we have here is not an apple with a worm in it, but we have actually just a ball of worms,” Musk explained, according to a report from The Hill.
“If you’ve got an apple that’s got a worm in it, maybe you can take the worm out, but if you’ve got actually just a ball of worms, it’s hopeless. And USAID is a ball of worms. There is no apple. And when there is no apple, you’ve just got to basically get rid of the whole thing,” Musk then stated. “That is why it’s got to go. It’s beyond repair.”
Staffers working for the agency revealed to the Associated Press that more than 600 employees were locked out of the system overnight. Individuals who were still allowed to log in were recipients of the aforementioned email message.
Musk and his team at DOGE have been attempting to gain control over USAID in order to gain access to the agency’s classified files, which include a number of intelligence reports.
“We spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper. Could’ve gone to some great parties. Did that instead,” Musk said during an X Spaces chat on Monday morning.
Earlier in the day on Sunday, Musk said, “USAID is a criminal organization. Time for it to die.” President Donald Trump also had some not-so-nice things to say about USAID in comments given to reporters on Sunday evening.
“It’s been run by a bunch of radical lunatics. And we’re getting them out,” Trump told members of the press.
