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Trump Issues Stop Work Order for USAID

Mary Alice Miller
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Trump Issues Stop Work Order for USAID

By Mary Alice Miller
On January 20, one of President Trump’s executive orders called for a 90-day pause on all foreign aid programs. No new projects are to be started, no contracts will be extended, and work is to be stopped on most existing programs.


According to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) website, “On Friday, February 7, 2025, at 11:59 pm (EST), all USAID direct hire personnel will be placed on administrative leave globally, with the exception of designated personnel responsible for mission-critical functions, core leadership, and specially designated programs.

Essential personnel expected to continue working will be informed by Agency leadership by Thursday, February 6, at 3:00 pm (EST).”


USAID personnel currently posted outside the United States have 30 days to pack up and return to the United States.


Established by Congress in 1961, USAID is the international humanitarian and development arm of the United States government, assisting nations in conflict and other “strategically important countries” by alleviating poverty, disease and other crises.


The 2024 budget for USAID is $42.8 billion for foreign assistance. USAID has more than 10,000 employees, with additional contractors and foreign nationals. USAID provides assistance to approximately 130 countries.


Until recently, USAID was an independent federal agency that received overall foreign policy guidance from the Secretary of State. On Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio was appointed as Acting Administrator of USAID. Rubio froze operations at the U.S. Agency for International Development.


The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 has presented USAID as a test case for conducting a hostile takeover of the government by cutting and redirecting spending and amending staffing.


“Congress has the power of the purse. When Congress allocates funding, the Constitution requires that the funding be spent by the president and the administration,” said Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic Minority Leader. “And the Constitution requires the president to take responsibility for the laws to be faithfully executed.

Spending agreements passed through the appropriations process are law. When those laws are being violated, the Constitution is being violated, which is why there has been a flurry of righteous litigation that has been unleashed. That will continue.”


Jeffries added, “We will never back down in pointing out what MAGA extremists are trying to do to hurt everyday Americans.”


Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said, “Over the past few days, Democrats have warned the American people that DOGE is operating like a shadow government. Yesterday, I said DOGE is not a real government agency. It has no authority to make spending decisions, shut down programs, or ignore federal law. This is not debatable. This is an indisputable fact.”


Schumer and Jeffries announced legislation that would prevent unlawful meddling in the Treasury Department’s payment system.


Among the programs affected is the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PETFAR).
Professor Ntobeko Ntusi, President and CEO of South African Medical Research Council spoke about the impact of Trump’s abrupt stop work order for USAID.


“The recent disruption to these programs had a significant impact immediately on operations on the ground. Just to give you an example of the scale of PETFAR, for instance, South Africa receives about 20% of the annual disbursement from PETFAR, which comes to about US $350 million. The PETFAR program employs over 250,000 doctors in 55 countries and over a million nurses and community health care workers,” said Ntusi.


“With the stop work orders received between January 24 and 27, all the staff members were immediately told to cease operations, 15- to 20,000 of them based in South Africa.

This meant that patients primarily with HIV infections who need to receive life-saving antiretroviral therapy as well as other treatments could no longer access their therapies.

The same has been true for other programmatic care programs,” said Ntusi. “As you can imagine, this has caused significant furor around the country. Many people have rallied and tried to get the U.S. administration to change its position.

On Friday, they issued a waiver now saying that the continued treatment of HIV will now be permitted in the USAID and PETFAR programs.”


Ntusi explained the impact of disruptions in antiretroviral treatment for HIV patients.
Patients with HIV need to take their antiretroviral therapy daily. What this does is keep the immune system functioning optimally and suppress the levels of the virus in the body. Once you have an interruption in the treatment, the levels of the virus begin to increase. This increases the risk of opportunist infection and cancers.

Most importantly, you need to sustain a steady level of the drugs in your system, and when they dip below a critical threshold for sustained or repeated periods, you can then develop resistance to the antiretroviral therapy as the HIV virus mutates, resulting in decreased efficacy in the treatment.


“Patients who received a refill in their medication last week could not access services and could not receive treatment,” said Ntusi. “I hope that with the waiver issued on Friday, many of the services will be recontinued from tomorrow onwards.”

Black Agenda Building in Trump Time

Nayaba Arinde
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By Nayaba Arinde
Editor at Large
@nayabaarinde1
While President Donald Trump has had his new administration ban acknowledgment of Black History Month, MLK Day, Juneteenth, etc., it has no actual effect on the Black folks who will continue to honor these days and all the others.


This past weekend, Brooklyn NAACP hosted “an evening of connection and community” at Peaches Prime in Downtown Brooklyn. They gave the community “a chance to unwind, network, and continue the day’s conversations over small bites and drinks while supporting local Black businesses and keeping our dollars circulating in the community.” These are the types of proactive actions taking place in boroughs, cities, and nationwide.


In the face of the changing American domestic policies in the form of healthcare, education, and social and economic strategies, organizations like Brooklyn’s NAACP are building the “opportunity to build relationships and strengthen our collective advocacy.”


With the hashtag #BlackBrooklyn2025, they cited that this assembly, like other events, is “a collaborative space where participants receive training on the New York City and New York State legislative and budget processes and actively contribute to developing an agenda that prioritizes the needs and aspirations of Black Brooklyn residents.”


Community proactivity is a chosen activist verb three weeks into Trump’s second term.
With his ICE agents raiding public spaces all over the city for undocumented immigrants, the streets are just a little bit quieter. And there is an edge.

Immigrants who used to be seen working, shopping, on the school run, and moving around the community infrastructure–but now the fear of an ICE visit has kept hundreds, if not thousands, hiding not in plain sight. But underlying the nervousness is that the Black community lets-get-on-with-it energy.


“We need to kill the fear and embrace what we believe in as a village,” said Danny Goodine, 20-year Department of Education school aid and founder of Brownsville’s Men Elevating Leadership. “Attendance is really dropping low. I see every parent holding on to their children a little tighter before they go into school. But I guarantee we protect our community.” “Trump is Trump, but the village is the village.”


At the same time, NYC Mayor Eric Adams is front and center of the Trump conversation.
The relationship between Brooklyn-born Queens-raised New York Mayor Adams and Queens-born President Trump has become national news. The Adams legal team has reportedly offered intricate support of Trump’s immigration plan in return for dropping the federal case against Adams.


The multi-indicted Mayor is running for reelection in a crowded field of challengers. There will be a June primary. Among the wannabes is high-polling, as yet undeclared former Governor Andrew Cuomo, with an Honan Strategy Group poll giving him 35% over current City Comptroller Brad Lander at 10%, Adams at 9%, and Brooklyn State Sen. Zellnor Myrie at 3% of voters’ support.


“African Americans continue to be frustrated politically because of our lack of unity and vision,” Rev. Conrad Tillard from Black Clergy for Economic Empowerment told Our Time Press.


“We have a mayor who has consistently empowered Black people at every level of government, is accessible and relatable. We should stay the course and re-elect Eric Adams. On the national scene, Trump is the president for the next four years, and we have to deal with him for the benefit of our people.

The problem with us politically is that we live in a two-party system but only have a one-party strategy. We put all our eggs in one basket. The question is, will Black leaders have the courage to petition the administration on behalf of our people? You can’t speak truth to power if you won’t even go in the room.”


As a Maryland federal judge on Wednesday, February 5th, blocked Trump’s 14th Amendment defying birthright citizenship ban, “We are witnessing a constitutional crisis. This is what the beginning of dictatorships looks like,” charged Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Abdullahi Omar when Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) stopped certain members of Congress from entering the USAID government building.


Over the past week, Trump caused mass national and international confusion with his tariff flip-flop. While last-minute negotiations halted his tariffs on Canada and Mexico, he upheld the 10% tariff on China, which in turn retaliated with tariffs on American coal, liquefied natural gas, crude oil, and farm equipment.


Trump has his unelected, almost deputized government official Elon Musk help gut or rearrange the USAID, the DOE, FBI, and CIA. The president floated a lead balloon when he announced the closure of social services federal funding affecting Medicaid, headstart, Social Security, all federally funded programs, housing aid, and more.


Would it float? No.
There was an apparent unified outcry from healthcare workers, parents, veterans, and politicians across the aisle and the general public “They’re testing. I don’t believe for a second that a glitch turned off the Medicaid portals. They’re seeing which things they can delete without a fight. Vets benefits Abuse shelters? Aid to children? Cancer research? They don’t care who gets hurt. Just what they can get away with. Keep. Fighting. Back,” saying, “Stay vigilant, we will win,” community advocate Amadi Ajamu re- posted ‘Democracy advocate’ Fred Wellman’s statement on Instagram.


Folk who ordinarily do not get involved in the matches and rallying and the rhetoric are responding too.


Like the immediate refusal to spend dollars at the once big chain stores that decided to end their DEI policy, Rev. Al Sharpton, for example, led a “buycott” to Costco in New York and Newark as Target dropped the federal program. Perhaps feeling the economic hit of less busy stores within the week of announcing their decision, and as online and on-the-ground activists launched the ‘Buy from the Black vendors directly and not the store,’ Target began promoting their Black-owned stock for Black History Month.


While one strike of the Trump executive order pen wipes out DEI and any federally funded Black History programs, Black folk opted instead to get on with established programs regardless.


Cinque Brath, son of famed historian and international activist Elombe Brath, told Our Time Press, “I can only say that in 2025, we need to actively incorporate the seven principles of Nguzo Saba and live Kwanzaa daily because nobody can pretend that they don’t see what things are foreshadowing for us in 2025. We will either flourish collectively or perish individually.”

Black History Month Will Never Be Cancelled Says ASALH

Fern Gillespie
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Black History Month Will Never Be Cancelled Says ASALH

By Fern Gillespie
While Donald Trump was destroying community enrichment DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusive) programs in the federal government in January, the rumors were floating around that the White House was cancelling Black History Month for February 2025.


Brooklyn resident, historian Dr. Zebulon (Zeb) Miletsky, PhD, was stunned. He chairs marketing and communications for the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, the founders of Black History Month.


“I saw it all over social media people. Intelligent people were thinking, “Is Black History Month canceled this year?” Dr. Miletsky, Associate Professor of Africana Studies at Stoney Brook, told Our Time Press. “So, the Association for Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) stepped in and we said ‘No.’ You can’t cancel what’s not yours.

ASALH was founded by Dr. Carter G. Woodson. We are the originators and the creators and inventors of Black History Month. Therefore, we are the owners of Black History Month even if you tried to cancel it, people were going to celebrate it anyway.”


On February 1, 2025, the White House issued a proclamation saluting Black History Month. American Presidents dating back to Ford and, even Trump’s first administration, have conducted this announcement. “Trump knows that he does not have the right, or the ability to cancel Black History Month,” said Dr. Miletsky. “All he could do is start the rumor mill about it.”


The Department of Defense banned, not only Black History Month and other DEI related celebrations, but Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wanted videos on the Tuskegee Airmen and Women’s Airforce Service Pilots removed from the education program.


“You’ve seen a pushback from the community that has caused Trump to reverse himself. That happened with the Tuskegee Airman at the Department of Defense,” said Dr. Miletsky. “They said we have changed our mind. You can show that video now to the Air Force.

That might not sound like much, but in the Trump era, that can be considered a very interesting victory.”
“It means that advocacy and organizing, still work.

We must push back,” he said. “Frederick Douglass said ‘power concedes nothing without a demand.’ You’re simply doing what our ancestors did, and what our forbearers did. They had tense moments. They had felt doubt and fear. Which people are feeling right now, but the antidote to that fear is organizing.”


Last year, Florida’s Governor DeSantis had the state’s Black History school curriculum rewritten so it deleted racism and stated Blacks benefited from slavery. In response, ASALH organized Freedom Schools in Florida that taught Black History.

“The classes continue to be held in churches, community centers, and other locations,” said Dr. Miletsky. “A lot of people paid attention and wanted to support it financially. They have had a lot of financial donations from grant programs, foundations and philanthropic organizations.”


On January 29, the Trump White House issued the executive order “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling.” It focuses on “patriotic education” in American schools by restricting discussions on racism and gender through threatening funding. “Patriotic education is a complete reversal and denial, and a literal whitewashing of history.

To bring things back to the way they used to be when they would teach history and leave us out. They didn’t talk about our history,” he said. “Patriotic education is their response to what they characterize as woke. If Trump is rolling out, that idea nationally, then we need Freedom Schools probably in every city in this nation.”


ASALH was founded in 1926. This year’s theme is “African Americans and Labor.” ASALH has collaborated with the National Urban League for the year-long celebration examining the labor theme. Marc Morial, President and CEO of the National Urban League, will be the keynote speaker at the annual Black History Month Luncheon and conference on February 22 in Washington, DC.

Speakers include Mary Frances Berry, former Assistant Secretary for Education in the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare under President Jimmy Carter and from 1993-2004 Chair of the United States Commission on Civil Rights. Also, ASALH will be exploring the impact of A. Philip Randolph, founder of the first Black union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.


Heading the 2025 Black History Month celebration is veteran historian Dr. Karsonya (Kaye) Wise Whitehead, who has been named national president of ASALH. “We are celebrating our visible labor—from the work we did back then to build the White House to the work we do right now to hold the White House accountable, from repairing the roads to teaching in our schools, from stocking shelves to packing and unloading trucks; from working in the federal government to our ongoing labor in the state and local offices—and, our invisible labor—from raising and teaching our children to caring for our aging family members, from finding ways to practice revolutionary self-care to finding ways to hope beyond hope in a country that frequently targets and terrorizes Black people,” said Dr. Whitehead, professor of Communication and African and African American Studies at Loyola University Maryland.


“Focus on Black labor is critical at this time,” said Dr. Miletsky. “Trump is going to be letting go and firing a great number of African Americans in civil service. In Washington DC, for many generations, that’s been jobs for Black folks. A significant part of the Black middleclass families in the DC area, Maryland and Virginia bought homes based on those incomes.”


At Dr. Miletsky‘s church, Calvary Fellowship AME Church in Bedford Stuyvesant, the congregation is constantly aware about Project 2025. A year ago, the pastor Rev Dr. Lisa Williamson, MD, made copies of Project 2025 and handed out to members of the church. “We keep it posted on our bulletin wall to this day,” he said.

“It reminds us what we’re fighting against and what we’re fighting for. So that we could study and be ready and be organized.”
ASALH programs are available on the website. For more information www.asalh.org

When I Hear Spirituals& The Reckoning

Brenda Greene
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When I Hear Spirituals& The Reckoning

By Cheryl Willis Hudson and Wade Hudson
(A Power Team in Black Writing and Publishing)

The Reckoning by Wade Hudson
Random House Children’s Books, 256 pages
When I Hear Spirituals
by Cheryl Wade Hudson
Illustrated by London Ladd
Holiday House, 40 pages.

Cheryl Willis Hudson and Wade Hudson, authors and founders of Just Us Books, a Black-owned business and recognized leader in multicultural publishing, are pioneers in the publishing industry. Their recent books The Reckoning (Random House Children’s Books, 2024) and When I Hear Spirituals ( Holiday House, 2025) continue their focus to write books that provide a Black lens for addressing the Black experience in America through themes related to history, social justice, family, race, identity, and joy.


The Reckoning by Wade Hudson captures a pivotal and emotional transformative experience for 12 year old Lamar Phillips who lives in Morton, Louisiana. After the brutal killing of his grandfather, Lamar refuses to accept that the killer shot his grandfather in self-defense and commits to uncovering the true story behind the murder of his grandfather, Joshua David Phillips.

Lamar has recently developed a connection with his grandfather who helped him to purchase a video recorder. The video recorder becomes a metaphor for exacting justice in this southern town. Lamar videotapes a Town Hall meeting where his grandfather takes the lead in demanding paved roads for the town and uses his video recorder to become one of the documentarians of the protests that are held to demand justice for the sudden death of his grandfather.


Teachable moments are woven throughout this compelling middle grade novel. Lamar is a young boy who has dreams of becoming a filmmaker in the tradition of Spike Lee. He orders a book called Smoketown:The Untold Story of the Other Great Black Renaissance by Mark Whitaker so that he can learn as much as he can about Black movies.

Smoketown adds to the Black literary canon and captures Black culture and influence in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from the 1920s to the 1950s.

Cheryl Willis Hudson and Wade Hudson


Lamar’s grandfather has been a strong advocate for social justice throughout his life as a civil rights activist in the sixties and as a leader and organizer of Black men during the Vietnam War.

He shares a documentary on Ida B. Wells with Lamar and his friends and he reminds them that they are the future and must continue the fight for social justice. In order to do that, they must read everything they can.


Throughout the novel, Hudson highlights the history and impact of student protests, the Black Lives Matter Movement, and the murders of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd to underscore the actions that Lamar and his family must take in advocating for justice for their slain elder. Although this book is in the middle school genre, it will resonate with both middle school and young adult readers.


When I Hear Spirituals, by Cheryl Willis Hudson, is a beautifully written and illustrated picture book that takes readers on a journey that captures spirituals or “Sorrow Songs” as W.E.B. DuBois calls them in his classic book, The Souls of Black Folk.

These spirituals reflect and portray the persistence and resilience of Black people as they fight throughout decades for liberation from enslavement and Jim Crow laws. The illustrations by London Ladd vividly capture the emotions, joy, and sorrow that spirituals have evoked for men, women, and children.


Like her husband Wade Hudson, Cheryl Willis Hudson provides teachable moments in this artfully composed book. At the end of When I Hear Spirituals, she presents readers with a list of resources that include her author’s note on the history of spirituals, historical figures and events illustrated in the book, a glossary of books, and a digital resource of spirituals.


Cheryl and Wade Hudson have each authored nearly 20 books with Just Us Books and other publishers. They began their journey as a power couple when they were raising their children and wanted to find books depicting Black images and families. Disappointed by the limited number of children’s books published by Black writers, they launched the AFRO-BETSR ABC which taught the alphabets using Afro-centric themes and images.

When they published AFRO-BETS-123 with orders from Black bookstores, parents’ groups, and teachers, 5000 copies of the book had been sold before the book was printed. The Hudsons subsequently started Just Us Books in their home. Since the beginning of their publishing endeavor, they have partnered with publishers such as Third World Press and Black Classic Press and have received numerous awards for their work.


Cheryl and Wade Hudson will be participants at the 2025 National Black Writers Conference on Young Adult and Middle School Literature at Medgar Evers College on March 29, 2025. For more information about the conference visit www.centerforblackliterature.org

Dr. Brenda M. Greene is Professor of English and Founder and Executive Director Emeritus of the Center for Black Literature at Medgar Evers College, CUNY.

The Hiram S. Thomas Story

Suzanne Spellen
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The Hiram S. Thomas Story

Black Excellence in the 19th Century

By Suzanne Spellen
Before COVID-19, we couldn’t imagine a world without restaurants. Whether plain or fancy, no matter the culture or meal, we have all gotten used to the idea of being able to enter an establishment where we could sit, choose our food from a menu, be served, and eat a meal prepared for us.


The modern American restaurant as we know it is not all that old. While taverns and inns that served food have been with us for centuries, the full service restaurant is a 19th century invention. Based on many worldly antecedents, it was born of the pre-Civil War urban experience and the rise of cities.


In 1762, NYC’s oldest tavern opened. Fraunce’s Tavern, like many such watering holes, served patrons whatever was in the pot that day. Vendors selling all manner of street foods have always been a part of the city, too. In the early 1800s, the direct ancestors of the city’s restaurants were its popular coffee shops and oyster bars.


Delmonico’s, in lower Manhattan, was the first and finest of New York’s restaurants. By the end of the century, it was THE place to eat and be seen as NY’s elite filled the cavernous restaurant every night. They had everything we associate with upscale dining – white clothed tables groaning with fine fare served on silver platters, an extensive wine list, a large menu of favorites and exotic new dishes to choose from, all served by impeccably mannered waiters who treated their guests like royalty.


But after the Civil War, the growing wealthy classes in our cities wanted more. Businessmen found conducting meetings over a meal could be conducive to better business. The rich on their Grand Tours were enjoying the restaurant experience in Paris and other European cities. Here, they were becoming more social, with theaters, concerts and other activities that took them away from home in the evening.

Hiram Thomas


It didn’t take long for this kind of dining and service to be replicated not only in places like Gage & Tollner and Peter Luger in Brooklyn, but in cities across the country. It was also expected in the resort hotels of the Gilded Age: the huge upscale palaces of Coney Island, the Jersey Shore and in resort towns like Saratoga Springs, in upstate New York.

Hiram S. Thomas’s Story
Into our story comes Hiram S. Thomas. Niagara Falls, Ontario was still called Drummondville when he was born in 1837. His family’s history there is unknown. He was college educated, but opportunities for black men with a college education were few in mid-19th century North America. He spent his early working years as a waiter and steward on passenger boats plying the Great Lakes and the Mississippi.


By the 1870s, during the presidency of Ulysses S. Grant, Thomas held the position of steward at the prestigious Capitol Club, in Washington DC. The club was the favorite dining place of politicians and businessmen. A steward was not just a waiter. While he could be called upon to deliver food or drink, he was more responsible for running the dining room and making sure the guests had everything they needed and had a pleasurable dining experience.


Many fine dining establishments of the day were staffed exclusively by black waiters, a trend that continued into the 20th century in some places, including Brooklyn’s Gage & Tollner. For reasons no doubt derived from slavery, it was seen as very classy to have a contingent of elegantly dressed black men trained to deliver impeccable service, performing their duties to perfection. Hiram Thomas was described as a tall, elegant and refined man himself, and his job as steward allowed him to interact with presidents and kings.


Everyone writing about Thomas describes him as well-spoken, witty and engaging. He was a favorite of President Grant, and later, of Presidents Cleveland and McKinley. He chatted with other prominent politicians and saw to the culinary needs of heads of industry and commerce, all patrons at the club. He was able to make a good living, much more than most black men of his time. He married, and he and his wife Julia would eventually have eight children: five daughters and three sons.


He left the Capitol Club and moved with his family to Saratoga Springs, the famed resort town north of Albany famous for its mineral springs, horse racing, gambling and luxury hotels. By the 1870s, Saratoga was the country’s top upscale resort destination. Visitors could board the Empire Express train at Grand Central Station in NYC and travel due north to Saratoga. Wealthy people from New York, Boston and Canada built large mansions in town, many of which still stand.


Anyone who was anyone came north, out of the city, for “the Season.” Many stayed at the Grand Union Hotel, which by 1876 could accommodate 2,000 guests and was billed as the largest hotel in the world. At that time, it was owned by A.T. Stewart, the ultra-wealthy owner of Manhattan’s largest department store of the same name. Writers from NYC called the hotel the “Waldorf of Saratoga.”


Hiram Thomas was hired as the hotel’s head waiter. An 1878 article in the St. Louis Globe, (syndicated from the NY Herald) describes the scene at dinner on a typical night at the Grand Union. His staff, many of them veterans of colored Union Army regiments, stood at attention at the doorways.


“At 2 pm 200 colored waiters stand spotless in an orderly array. The far-famed Hiram S. Thomas, a man of gigantic but graceful frame, is their generalissimo. His captains-general, attired like himself in full evening suits of black, are stationed at equal distances apart down the center aisle. The lieutenants stand along the sides.

Every table is attended, according to its size, with two to four waiters, and every waiter is watched by the assistance of the generalissimo…Watch the generalissimo! With what intuition he comprehends the disposition and wish of each hungry guest.

Always polite and accommodating, never hurried, yet performing his task with a celerity that saves everyone from waiting, this potentate of the dining room is an artist.”


Thomas did well here, and his fame and reputation grew. His bank account and ambitions grew too. In 1888, he took over the running of an upscale resort hotel on Saratoga Lake called Moon’s. He renamed it the Lake House. In the beginning he only owned the restaurant, he later bought the entire establishment.

He brought his now-famous class and elegance to the Lake House. The hotel was mentioned often in New York’s society pages, where they referred to Thomas as the well-known and respected colored man who owned it.

(To be continued)

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