The US Supreme Court rejected a Trump administration bid to freeze some $2 billion in foreign aid payments
The US Supreme Court rejected a Trump administration bid to freeze some $2 billion in foreign aid payments AFP

A divided US Supreme Court handed a legal defeat to President Donald Trump on Wednesday, rejecting his bid to freeze some $2 billion in foreign aid payments.

The top court, in its first significant ruling on a legal challenge to the Trump administration, voted 5-4 to uphold a lower court order requiring that payments be made on aid contracts that have already been completed.

The justices said the federal judge who ordered the resumption of payments for contracts with the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the State Department "should clarify what obligations the Government must fulfill."

Conservatives John Roberts, the chief justice, and Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump appointee, voted with the three liberals on the nine-member Supreme Court.

Justice Samuel Alito wrote a dissent that was joined by the three other conservatives.

"Does a single district-court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the Government of the United States to pay out (and probably lose forever) 2 billion taxpayer dollars?" Alito wrote.

"The answer to that question should be an emphatic 'No,' but a majority of this Court apparently thinks otherwise. I am stunned," he added.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which has backed several legal challenges to moves by the Trump administration, welcomed the Supreme Court decision.

"President Trump's attempt to halt foreign aid funding was a reckless, cruel, and unprecedented abuse of executive power," ACLU executive director Anthony Romero said in a statement.

"The lower court rightly held that President Trump exceeded his authority when he unilaterally declared he was freezing funding for programs Congress had already authorized, stiffing federal contractors who had already done work," Romero said.

District Judge Amir Ali, an appointee of former president Joe Biden, issued a temporary restraining order last month prohibiting the administration from "suspending, pausing, or otherwise preventing" foreign assistance funds.

Trump has launched a campaign led by his top donor Elon Musk, the world's richest person, to downsize or dismantle swaths of the US government.

The most concentrated fire has been on USAID, the primary organization for distributing US humanitarian aid around the world with health and emergency programs in some 120 countries.

Trump has said USAID was "run by radical lunatics" and Musk has described it as a "criminal organization" needing to be put "through the woodchipper."