WASHINGTON – A federal judge on Friday dealt President Donald Trump and billionaire ally Elon Musk their first big setback in their dismantling of the US Agency for International Development, saying he will order a temporary halt to plans to pull thousands of agency staffers off the job. US District Judge Carl Nichols, who was nominated by Trump, sided with two federal employee associations in agreeing to a pause in plans to put 2,200 employees on paid leave as of midnight Friday. Nichols stressed his order was not a decision on the employees’ request to roll back the administration’s swiftly moving destruction of the agency. “CLOSE IT DOWN,” Trump said on social media of USAID before the judge’s ruling. The American Foreign Service Association and the American Federation of Government Employees argue that Trump lacks the authority to shut down the six-decade-old aid agency without approval from Congress. Democratic lawmakers have made the same argument.

Trump’s administration moved quickly Friday to literally erase the agency’s name. Workers on a crane scrubbed the name from the stone front of its Washington headquarters. They used duct tape to block it out on a sign and took down USAID flags. Someone placed a bouquet of flowers outside the door. (Jamaica Gleaner/ Foto: AP)