Obama-appointed judge rules USAID shutdown likely unlawful

A federal judge dealt a major blow to the Trump administration’s war on bureaucracy Tuesday, ruling that Elon Musk and the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency likely violated the Constitution by unilaterally shutting down the U.S. Agency for International Development.

In a scathing 68-page decision, U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, sided with more than two dozen current and former USAID employees and contractors who sued to block the agency’s abrupt dismantling. “The Constitution’s Appointments Clause and separation of powers stand as a bulwark against precisely this kind of unilateral executive action,” Chuang wrote.