Representatives from numerous nonprofit organizations attending a significant human rights conference in Taipei, Taiwan, were met with shocking news on Thursday. In the hours preceding, the Donald Trump administration had unexpectedly declared it would terminate almost 10,000 contracts and grants from the US State Department, which included the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), as well as the US Agency for International Development (USAID), accounting for roughly 90 percent of USAID’s total contracts.
This announcement marks the latest in a series of initiatives by the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) aimed at reducing foreign aid from the US, which has historically provided medical and humanitarian support to millions globally. A letter from USAID, reviewed by WIRED, instructed grantees to “immediately halt all activities, terminate all subawards and contracts,” and to refrain from accruing any additional costs “beyond those unavoidable costs associated with this Termination Notice.”
Numerous digital and human rights organizations that spoke with WIRED in Taipei—most requesting anonymity out of concern for retaliation from the Trump administration or their own governments—assert that the funding cuts have jeopardized years of efforts toward global democracy-building and free speech initiatives, endangering the lives and jobs of their staff worldwide.
Many groups present at RightsCon, one of the largest annual gatherings focused on human rights and technology organized by the nonprofit Access Now, specifically aim to provide cybersecurity assistance to journalists, activists, and other vulnerable populations in authoritarian regimes, shielding them from doxxing and hacking threats intended to intimidate and silence them. Without the funding from USAID and the State Department, this crucial work is likely to come to a halt.
“The digital security ecosystem for NGOs has completely collapsed,” declares Mohammed Al-Maskati, director of Access Now’s digital security helpline, which provides complimentary digital security support to journalists, activists, and civil society organizations.
Adding to the confusion, just days after the cancellation notices were disseminated, some organizations reported receiving messages asserting that the notifications were sent in error, according to communications reviewed by WIRED. It remains unclear how the Trump administration decided which grants and organizations would be preserved.
Nonprofit organizations that manage to retain their US government funding, however, will face a new stipulation: Their contracts now contain a rider requiring compliance with an anti-DEI executive order signed by Trump in late January. This condition applies to all of an organization’s initiatives, even if they aren’t all funded by American support. Noncompliance with the order could result in a breach of the false claims act, as warned by the Trump administration in materials examined by WIRED.
When WIRED first inquired about the cancellations, a representative from the State Department stated that “each program underwent a review with the intent of restructuring assistance to align with the administration’s policy priorities. Programs that support our national interests will continue. However, programs that do not align with our national interest will be discontinued.”
The State Department did not respond to follow-up inquiries concerning the reinstatement of specific grants. USAID did not provide comments upon request. In a post on X on Monday, Musk asserted that “no one has died as a result of a brief pause to reassess foreign aid funding. No one.” He characterized DOGE’s involvement at the agency last month more dramatically, boasting about having spent a weekend “feeding USAID into the wood chipper.”
