A major Catholic charity may have to lay off as much as 50 percent of its staff due to being reliant on funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which President Donald J. Trump may shut down. Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is the top recipient of USAID, with the agency funding about half of the charity’s $1.5 billion annual budget.
In a staff-wide email sent on February 3, CRS president and CEO Sean Callahan stated that layoffs have already begun as the charity looks to cut programs. “We anticipate that we will be a much smaller overall organization by the end of this fiscal year,” Callahan stated.
From 2013 to 2022, CRS received a massive $4.6 billion in funding from USAID for various programs, including disaster assistance. The organization had around 7,800 employees across the globe as of 2018.
CRS also provides money toward migrants and refugees, as does Catholic Charities, another Catholic group. Last year, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit against the Catholic NGO Annunciation House, accusing its members of encouraging illegal immigration and hosting illegals.
The cut in staff at CRS comes after tech billionaire Elon Musk, recently appointed to lead President Donald J. Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), announced that President Trump intends to shut down USAID entirely.
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