US State Dept forms new humanitarian bureau after foreign aid overhaul
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Trump officials and the US Department of Government Efficiency dismantled the US Agency for International Development after taking office in January 2025.
PHOTO: REUTERS
WASHINGTON – The US State Department on March 20 established a new bureau to oversee US responses to natural disasters and humanitarian crises around the world, capping the Trump administration’s dramatic overhaul of foreign aid, a senior department official said.
Trump officials and Mr Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency dismantled the US Agency for International Development after taking office in January 2025, firing thousands of officials and cancelling most of its grants before it was absorbed into the State Department.
The official said the new Bureau of Disaster and Humanitarian Response would be staffed by about 200 officials, operate in 12 hubs around the world and receive roughly US$5.4 billion (S$6.9 billion) a year in funding.
It would narrowly focus on “life-saving” aid rather than things like climate projects and what the official called “social causes”.
It would also oversee global food security, said the official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity ahead of the announcement.
USAID managed about US$40 billion a year and also funded longer-term development projects around the world. Some of that work continues in other parts of the State Department.
“We are going to pick more carefully the stuff that we respond to. It’s not the United States’ responsibility to respond to every disaster, every crisis, especially when our adversaries or groups that hate the United States are at issue,” the official said.
“We’re not the world’s policeman. We’re not the world’s social safety net. But when our allies and strategic partners need our help, and when there’s stuff that we’re engaging in because it’s important to our national interest, then we’re going to be, I think, allocating more resources there.”
The new bureau falls under the under secretariat for foreign assistance, humanitarian affairs and religious freedom, which is currently without a Senate-confirmed leader and is headed by former DOGE staffer Jeremy Lewin.
The new bureau will initially be headed by Mr Ryan Shrum, who has been serving as Mr Lewin’s chief of staff, the official said. REUTERS
