Devex: U.S. lawmakers move to block White House ‘rescission’ attempts
“A battle for control over U.S. foreign aid spending is playing out in between the lines of a budget bill currently making its way through the U.S. House of Representatives. Lawmakers have included new language and policy guidance in their latest foreign affairs budget bill — which passed through committee on Thursday — that pushes back against recent attempts by the Trump administration to retract foreign aid funding that had already been appropriated by Congress…” (Igoe, 5/17).

Devex: Fund sharing and fragility in spotlight at Africa policy congressional hearing
“The U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee held a wide-ranging hearing Thursday focused on how the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Department of State, and the Department of Defense can coordinate on Africa policy. … Officials at the hearing touched on Ebola, instability in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, and Cameroon, and discussed opportunity in Ethiopia and how agencies might best work together…” (Saldinger, 5/17).

Devex: Implementers, missions in the dark about Central America assistance cuts
“Seven weeks after President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement that he would stop U.S. foreign assistance to the ‘Northern Triangle,’ implementers remain largely in the dark about if and how their programs in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras may be impacted. … Amid concern that the move is another way for a Trump administration skeptical of foreign assistance to restrict U.S. funding, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel, a Democrat from New York, and Ranking Member Michael McCaul, a Republican from Texas, introduced a bill last week that would obligate the administration to spend the money Congress appropriates for the Northern Triangle…” (Welsh, 5/17).