FROM NY POST: President Trump is moving to cancel nearly $5 billion in congressionally approved foreign aid and peacekeeping spending in a rare “pocket rescission,” The Post has learned — making use of a legally debated maneuver that hasn’t been done in 48 years.
Trump on Thursday night notified Congress of his request to cancel the funds, which had been tied up in a court case until earlier in the day.
A pocket rescission is a request that’s presented to Congress so late in the fiscal year — which ends Sept. 30 — that it takes effect regardless of whether Congress approves.
The clawback includes $3.2 billion in United States Agency for International Development (USAID) development assistance, $322 million from the USAID-State Department Democracy Fund, $521 million in State Department contributions to international organizations, $393 million in State Department contributions to peacekeeping activities and $445 million in separately budgeted peacekeeping aid.
The money was intended to benefit several nonprofits and foreign governments, but it had been held back this year by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The prompted a lawsuit filed by the Global Health Council.
Then on Thursday, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals lifted an injunction in the case, allowing the Trump administration to attempt the first pocket rescission since 1977.
Many of the spending items that would have received funding are accused of being wasteful. Examples include:
- $24.6 million for “climate resilience” in Honduras
- $2.7 million for the South African Democracy Works Foundation, who published inflammatory racial articles including “The Problem with White People”
- $3.9 million to promote democracy among LGBT people in the Western Balkans
- $1.5 million to market the paintings of Ukrainian women
- $838 million in peacekeeping funds, including money for United Nations peacekeeping forces in places such at the Democratic Republic of Congo, where Trump recently helped solidify a peace deal with Rwanda, and the Central African Republic, “where the mission has been criticized as aligned with Russian business interests,” the Post reports.
🚨 Last night, President Trump CANCELLED $4.9 billion in America Last foreign aid using a pocket rescission.@POTUS will always put AMERICA FIRST! pic.twitter.com/1DvXYGdy3B
— Office of Management and Budget (@WHOMB) August 29, 2025
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