SCOTUS Rules Against Trump, Orders $2B In Funds Be Paid Out to USAID Contractors

The Supreme Court rejected on Wednesday a request by the Trump administration to refrain from paying some $2 billion in foreign aid.

The decision was divided, with five justices siding with the contractors who sued the administration to release the funds. Four conservative justices dissented with the ruling: Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, CNN reported.

That means that the majority was formed by Chief Justice John Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Despite the ruling , the court did not specify when the payments must be made, allowing the administration to continue its legal battle in lower courts.

Concretely, the majority said that since a deadline given by a lower court had already passed, they should "clarify what obligations the government must fulfil to ensure compliance with the temporary restraining order."

The Trump administration took the matter to the highest court in the country after federal judge Amir H. Ali ruled funds should be unfrozen to pay specifically to the accusers.

To back his decision, Ali remarked that the Trump administration did not offer "any explanation for why a blanket suspension of all congressionally appropriated foreign aid, which set off a shockwave and upended" contracts with groups across the world "was a rational precursor to reviewing programs," a reference to the government's argument about needing to freeze the program to review which should be kept and which discarded.

The ruling applies to existing contracts before Trump's executive order. He ordered the agencies pay all invoices and "letter of credit drawdown requests" on all work completed before the February 13 order. "Defendants shall take no actions to impede the prompt payments of appropriated foreign assistance funds, and shall take all necessary actions to ensure the prompt payments of appropriated foreign assistance funds," judge Ali said.

Despite this legal battle in particular, the Trump administration is fast moving to end most foreign aid moving forward, saying it is eliminating more than 90% of all such contracts concerning USAID. It also said it is ending some $60 billion in assistance around the world, leaving few surviving projects.

Originally published on Latin Times