US Supreme Court Allows President Trump To Withhold $4 Billion In Foreign Aid

Last Updated:September 27, 2025, 04:10 IST

The US Supreme Court let Donald Trump freeze $4 billion in foreign aid, sparking dissent from liberal justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

The $4 billion in foreign aid, including for global health and HIV programmes, was allocated by Congress but Donald Trump deemed wasteful and has been fighting on two fronts

The US Supreme Court on Friday allowed President Donald Trump to freeze $4 billion in foreign aid payments.

According to a report by CNN, the $4 billion in foreign aid, including for global health and HIV programmes, was allocated by Congress but Trump deemed wasteful and has been fighting on two fronts. His administration had also been seeking to “rescind” the money through Congress.

The court said that the argument by Trump administration that the lower court’s order requiring the money to be spent would affect its “conduct of foreign affairs” appeared to “outweigh the potential harm” faced by the nonprofit groups hoping to compete for that money.

“This order should not be read as a final determination on the merits,” the court wrote in its unsigned order. “The relief granted by the court today reflects our preliminary view, consistent with the standards for interim relief.”

The Trump administration had said that the cuts would be in those foreign aid programmes which were in conflict with “American values”.

The cuts would reduce or eliminate micro-insurance programs for small farmers in Colombia to recover from climate disasters, for instance, and build “climate resilience in Honduras,” CNN reported.

Meanwhile, the three liberal justices of the court dissented.

According to Reuters, the court’s liberals, in a dissent written by Justice Elena Kagan, called the ruling an affront to the constitutional principle that power is separated between the three branches – executive, legislative and judicial – of the US government.

They said the Constitution “gives Congress the power to make spending decisions through the enactment of appropriations laws.”

“If those laws require obligation of the money, and if Congress has not by rescission or other action relieved the Executive of that duty, then the Executive must comply,” Kagan wrote in a dissent joined by fellow liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

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