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“There were a few programs that were cut in other countries that
were not meant to be cut, that have been rolled back and put
into place,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told
reporters.
Bruce said she had no immediate information on which countries
had U.S. funding for food aid restored after a dayslong cutoff.
She gave no explanation for how some contracts came to be
canceled in error.
The World Food Program didn't immediately respond to messages
seeking comment.
The Associated Press reported Monday that the Trump
administration cut funding to WFP emergency programs helping
keep millions alive in Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen and 11 other
countries, many of them struggling with conflict, according to
the agency and officials who spoke to the AP.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other administration
officials had pledged to spare emergency food programs and other
life-and-death aid even as the Trump administration and Elon
Musk's Department of Government Efficiency dismantled the U.S.
Agency for International Development.
All but several hundred of USAID's thousands of contracts for
aid and development programs abroad have been eliminated. The
new cuts had hit some of the last remaining humanitarian
programs run by USAID.
Notices sent over the last week had said U.S. funding for WFP
emergency programs in 14 countries were among about 60 being
canceled in the Middle East, Africa, Central and South America
and the Pacific Islands “for the convenience of the U.S.
Government.”
Those latest terminations were at the direction of Jeremy Lewin,
a top DOGE lieutenant who was appointed to oversee the
elimination of USAID programs, according to termination notices
sent to partners and viewed by the AP.
The WFP, the world's largest provider of food aid, had publicly
appealed to the U.S. on Monday to reconsider cuts worth hundreds
of millions of dollars for food programs.
“This could amount to a death sentence for millions of people
facing extreme hunger and starvation,” WFP posted on X.
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