The dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development for the Efficiency Department of the Government of multimillionaire Elon Musk probably violated the Constitution, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday when he indefinitely blocked to Dute to make more cuts to the agency.
The order requires that the Trump administration restore access to email and computer to all USAID employees, including those who are presented on administrative license, although it seems not to stop the shooting or completely resurrect the agency.
In one of Doge's first demands against Musk himself, the American district judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland rejected the position of the Trump administration that Musk is simply President Donald Trump's advisor.
The public statements of Musk and publications on social networks show that it has “firm control over doge”, found the judge pointing an online publication where Musk said he had “fed USAID to the wooden splinter.”
The judge acknowledged that it is likely to use Usaid is no longer able to perform some of his legally required functions.
“Taken together, these facts support the conclusion that USAID has been effectively eliminated,” Chuang wrote in the preliminary mandate.
The demand presented by the employees and contractors of the USAID argued that Musk and Dog are wielding the power that the Constitution reserves only for those who gain elections or are confirmed by the Senate.
Their lawyers said the ruling “stops or reverses many of the steps taken to dismantle the agency.
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The administration has said that Dege is looking for and disarticulating waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government, according to the message of the campaign that helped Trump win the 2024 elections. The White House and Doge did not immediately respond to a request for comments on the ruling.
Musk, his team and the political appointment of Trump, Pete Marocco, have played a central role in the two -month dismantling of USAID. In a case at the beginning of February, the Administration placed the senior security officials of the forced license agency after they tried to prevent Dixes workers from accessing the Usaid classified and confidential documents.
The administration, with the support of Musk and Doge, continued ordering everyone but a fraction of the agency's employees outside the work through forced leaves and shots, and ended what the State Department said that it was at least 83% of the USAID program contracts.
The movements were part of a broader impulse of Musk and the Trump administration to eradicate the foreign assistance agency of six decades and most of their work abroad.
Trump, on the day of the inauguration, issued an executive order that directed a freezing of foreign assistance funds and a review of all the help and development work of the United States abroad, which much of foreign assistance was wasteful and advanced a liberal agenda.
Democratic legislators and other USAID supporters have argued that Trump had no authority to retain funds that Congress already approved.
Chuang said that Usaid's destruction of USAID of Doge and Musk probably damaged the public interest by depriving the chosen legislators of their “constitutional authority to decide if, when and how to close an agency created by Congress.”
The lawsuit was filed by the State Democracy Defenders Fund. Norm Eisen, executive president of the non -profit organization, said that the ruling is a milestone in rejection of Doge and the first to find that Musk's actions violate the name clause of the Constitution, which requires the presidential approval and confirmation of the Senate for certain public officials.
“They are performing surgery with a chainsaw instead of a scalpel, damaging not only the people use Usaid but most of the Americans who have the stability of our government,” he said in a statement.
Abby Maxman of Oxfam America, in a statement, urged all staff members and funds to be reinstated.
“The freezing of funds and programs already have consequences of life or death for millions worldwide,” said the executive director of the humanitarian group.
Associated Press writers Chris Megerian and Ellen Knickmeyer contributed reports.
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