Trump Admin Forces Out USAID Official Who Refused to Comply With 'Illegal' Purge

A career official at the U.S. Agency for International Development informed his colleagues Thursday that he was placed on administrative leave after refusing to carry out what he described as an unlawful purge directive handed down by the agency's front office and the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency.

Nicholas Gottlieb, director of employee and labor relations at USAID, wrote in an email to other agency workers that he was "instructed... to violate the due process of our employees by issuing immediate termination notices to a group of employees."

"I refused and have provided Acting Administrator [Jason] Gray with written notification of my refusal," Gottlieb continued. "I have recommended in that written notification that his office cease and desist from further illegal activity."

Gottlieb went on to write that he was placed on administrative leave, effective immediately, after declining to carry out the termination directive.

Gottlieb's removal comes days after the Trump administration placed dozens of senior USAID officials on leave, accusing them—without providing any specific details—of attempting to "circumvent" the president's sweeping freeze on U.S. foreign aid. (Military assistance to Israel is among the few exemptions.)

According to The Washington Post, Gottlieb on Thursday sent an email to the officials placed on administrative leave saying he had "reviewed the materials that served as the purported basis for your placement in this status" and "found no evidence that you engaged in misconduct.”

The aid freeze has led U.S.-funded aid programs around the world, including some that provide life-saving humanitarian assistance, to begin "firing staff and shutting down," The Associated Press reported earlier this week.

"The aid community is grappling with just how existential this aid suspension is," said Oxfam America president Abby Maxman, whom AP described as "one of the few aid officials willing to speak publicly about the impact of the freeze following Trump administration warnings not to."

Citing current and former USAID officials, Reuters reported earlier this week that the ongoing purge at the agency appears "designed to silence any dissent" over Trump's "plans to dramatically reshape U.S. foreign aid."

While the Trump administration's assault on government agencies and officials has been far-reaching, USAID has emerged as a top target of White House officials.

Stephen Miller, the far-right extremist serving as White House deputy chief of staff, singled out USAID during a CNN appearance earlier this week, claiming without evidence that 98% of the agency's workforce "either donated to Kamala Harris or another left-wing candidate."

Vox's Dylan Matthews wrote Thursday that USAID is "worth paying attention to, both because it does important work that belies its size and status, and because it's become an early case study in how the second Trump administration plans to dismantle major parts of the federal bureaucracy."

"Perhaps the most important function of the shock-and-awe campaign of funding freeze and mass administrative leaves has been to put the rest of USAID's workforce on notice," Matthews wrote. "The USAID staff I spoke with were mostly unwilling to be quoted due to fear of retaliation, and all of them described an atmosphere of uncertainty, unease, and omnipresent fear that one could lose one's job at any moment."

"This is not an environment in which one can imagine an agency of any kind operating effectively," he added.