All U.S. Agency for International Development direct hires deemed non-essential will be placed on administrative leave at 11:59 p.m. ET Sunday, according to an email sent from the Office of the Administrator and reviewed by CBS News.

The Trump administration said on Sunday that it is cutting 2,000 U.S.-based positions at the U.S. Agency for International Development, while also putting a majority of global employees at the agency on leave.

Judge Carl Nichols in a Friday ruling allowed President Donald Trump's staff reductions in the US Agency for International Development to proceed.

A federal judge has cleared the way for the Trump administration to pull thousands of U.S. Agency for International Development staffers off the job. U.S.

The move was the latest and one of the biggest steps yet toward what rump and cost-cutting ally Elon Musk say is their goal of gutting the 6-decade-old aid and development agency in a broader campaign to slash the size of the federal government.

The judge said the Trump administration’s latest statement contradicted a “crystal clear” understanding about how overseas government workers would be treated.

The Trump administration said in a court filing late Tuesday night that it is not disbursing funds for thousands of foreign aid contracts and grants despite a federal judge's order last week to lift a widespread freeze on foreign aid funding.

U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols chastised President Donald Trump's administration, saying that what has happened at USAID has created a "mess." Politico legal reporter Kyle Cheney wrote Wednesday that it became clear in court that the administration had no idea what is happening with USAID employees who were abandoned abroad after it conducted