The U.S. State Department has announced a partnership with faith-based organizations to distribute nearly $2 billion in international humanitarian aid.
The move follows the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development and the cutting of at least $26 billion in foreign assistance by the Trump administration in 2025.
The “America First Global Health Strategy” awards include $1.4 billion to provide health services through faith-based and community hospitals in 20 countries, according to the Aug. 6 announcement.
A consortium of faith-based groups led by World Vision will distribute a separate “Faith and Community Initiative” of $850 million over five years to support more than 2,500 faith-based clinics, hospitals and community centers in more than 17 countries. The funds also will be used to train, equip, supply and pay more than 30,000 local health workers in those regions.
Another $570 million will go directly to faith-based and community clinics and hospitals, the State Department added.
An additional $538 million for humanitarian response will be allotted to Samaritan’s Purse and a group of organizations led by World Vision and Compassion International, including $100 billion for emergency response in 23 disaster-prone nations.
“By leveraging faith-based and community-run hospitals and clinics, the Department of State is strengthening health service delivery that prevents illness, saves lives and ensures a path toward self-reliance,” the State Department release said.
“Samaritan’s Purse, World Vision, and Compassion International exemplify the administration’s commitment to partnering with faith-based and community organizations that responsibly steward taxpayer dollars while delivering lifesaving assistance to those in need.”
But it was some of those very groups that lamented the administration’s dismantling of USAID and other foreign aid last year.
Leaders with Compassion International, World Vision and several other organizations traveled to Washington, D.C., in March 2025 to urge the administration to reconsider its severe cuts to global aid.
While Elon Musk, whose DOGE network tore down USAID, said no one would die from the cuts in foreign assistance, aid experts at the time estimated 1 million children would suffer severe malnutrition and that up to 3 million would die from preventable diseases as a result of aid cuts.
Margaret Schuler
A June study by World Vision and the World Food Program reported that 40% of households in eight countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America had eaten at most one meal the day before the survey was conducted.
“The impact of humanitarian aid cuts go far beyond hunger — we’re seeing families forced into impossible choices that put children’s health, safety, education and well-being at risk,” said Margaret Schuler, senior vice president of international programs at World Vision. “No parent should have to make those choices, yet for many, that is the reality. These cuts deepen hardship and limit how families can build stable futures.”
But Samaritan’s Purse President Franklin Graham, a major ally and defender of President Trump, took a supportive stance toward the demise of USAID in a March 2025 Time article. It was then that Samaritan’s Purse received $19 million in frozen USAID funds.
“Because the staff at USAID was allowed to misappropriate billions of dollars, I think the pendulum is going to swing to a point where the baby may be thrown out with the bathwater. And that is tragic, but it’s because the culture of USAID got so far off track,” Graham charged without evidence.
Graham’s organization has been separately awarded $300 million for natural disaster response during the next two years, according to Christianity Today.
The magazine also reported Schuler had been working on the consortium approach to humanitarian aid for a year. “Our No. 1 interest from the beginning was to get resources flowing back out to communities that need it. It was hard to see those resources stop.”
Other consortium members include the Accord Network, World Relief, ADRA International, Catholic Relief Services, HOPE worldwide, International Care Ministries, and LifeNet International. The administration announced a separate $240 million grant to Catholic Relief Services.
Freedom from Religion Foundation Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor criticized the administration for awarding more than $1 billion on the basis of religious belief.
“The administration is openly restructuring American foreign assistance around religion. Humanitarian aid should be based on humanitarian need and the ability to provide effective, secular services, not on whether an organization puts ‘faith in action,’” she said. “Taxpayers should not be forced to bankroll an administration’s campaign to elevate and subsidize religion.”
The inclusion of Samaritan’s Purse, which is anti-LGBTQ and claims to share the gospel in all it does, further demonstrates the State Department’s approach is unconstitutional, Gaylor added.
“Feeding hungry people and providing medical treatment are worthy public purposes. Preaching the gospel is not a government purpose. When an organization expressly combines humanitarian assistance with an evangelical mission, the government has a heightened obligation to ensure that not one taxpayer dollar subsidizes religious activity, proselytizing or religious discrimination.”