The US Supreme Court has rejected Donald Trump’s administration request to keep $2 billion in foreign aid approved by Congress.
According to CBS News, the Supreme Court, in a divided decision on Wednesday, March 5, 2025, declined the Trump administration's request to halt the lower court order decision requiring it to unfreeze nearly $2 billion in foreign-aid funding.
The highest court of the country, with a 5-4 ruling, cleared the way for the billions of dollars to flow to groups that worked for the State Department and US Agency for International Development overseas.
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Four conservative justices, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh, dissented with the orders, but five justices, Chief Justice John Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown Jackson, supported the orders.
Alito wrote in a dissent joined by the three other conservative justices, “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?"
"The answer to that question should be an emphatic 'No,' but a majority of this Court apparently thinks otherwise. I am stunned," he added.
Meanwhile, the majority of the judges noted that the court-ordered deadline to spend the money had already passed and the lower courts should “clarify what obligations the government must fulfil to ensure compliance with the temporary restraining order.”
For the unversed, the Trump administration requested the emergency help in the Supreme Court after lower court judge Amir Ali ordered the government to pay outstanding bills and reimbursement requests to contractors who worked with USAID and the State Department before February 13.
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