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Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Monday that he is acting administrator of the US Agency for International Development, confirming the de-facto takeover of the humanitarian agency by the State Department.

Rubio said in a letter to lawmakers Monday he had delegated the authority of acting administrator to Pete Marocco, a Trump appointee who served at USAID in the president’s first term and has been accused by aid groups and officials of intentionally dismantling the organization.

Marocco, who is also serving as the State Department’s head of foreign assistance, drafted the directive to freeze almost all foreign aid. One aid official said that Marocco “knows how the system works and is dismantling it at every turn.”

The news came hours after Elon Musk, the world’s richest man charged with overhauling the federal government, said President Donald Trump had signed off on shutting the agency down. Democrats say that it is not legal for the president to shutter a federal agency without consulting Congress.

Rubio, in a letter to the heads of Congress’ committees on foreign affairs and appropriations Monday, said he had authorized Marocco “to begin the process of engaging in a review and potential reorganization of USAID’s activities to maximize efficiency and align operations with the national interest.”

“The Department of State and other pertinent entities will be consulting with Congress and the appropriate committees to reorganize and absorb certain bureaus, offices, and missions of USAID,” he wrote in the letter, a copy of which was obtained by CNN.

Speaking to the press in El Salvador, Rubio said the “functions of USAID” must align with US foreign policy and that it is “a completely unresponsive agency.”

Speaking to the press in El Salvador Monday, Rubio was asked about the arguments that USAID’s work is vital to national security and promoting US interests.

“There are things that USAID, that we do through USAID, that we should continue to do, and we will continue to do,” he said.

“This is not about ending the programs that USAID does, per se,” he said. “There are things that it does that are good and there are things that it does that we have strong questions about.”

Rubio claimed his “frustration with USAID” went back to his time in Congress. In 2017, the former senator defended the importance of foreign assistance.

“Foreign Aid is not charity. We must make sure it is well spent, but it is less than 1% of budget & critical to our national security,” he wrote in a post on X at the time.

The longtime international aid agency has found itself in the crosshairs of Trump and Musk’s effort to reform the federal government. Trump and his allies have said the agency, created by Congress as an independent body, is overtly partisan. Democrats have rejected that assertion and say Trump does not have the authority to dismantle the agency.

Later, Monday, Trump said he doesn’t need Congress to scrap the agency.

“Not when it comes to fraud. If there’s fraud, these people are lunatics,” Trump said when questioned by CNN’s Jeff Zeleny about his capacity to exact major changes to USAID.

“We just want to do the right thing. It’s something that should have been done a long time ago. Went crazy during the Biden administration. They went totally crazy what they were doing and the money they were giving to people that shouldn’t be getting,” Trump said in the Oval Office.

“We’ll be doing a report,” he went on. “We’ll be giving you that report at the appropriate time.”

Pressed about his support for USAID during his first term in office, Trump said he loved the “concept” but not the execution of the agency’s mission.

“They turn out to be radical left lunatics. And the concept of it is good, but it’s all about the people,” he said.

Democratic lawmakers reacted angrily to the Trump administration’s moves.

“Trying to shut down the Agency for International Development by executive order is plain illegal,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen said at a press conference in front of the USAID headquarters in Washington, DC, on Monday. “Elon Musk may get to be dictator of Tesla. And he may try to play dictator here in Washington, DC, but he doesn’t get to shut down the Agency for International Development.”

Sen. Chris Murphy called the moment “a constitutional crisis.” The Democratic lawmakers vowed to defend USAID against the “outrageous, scandalous, illegal maneuver,” in the words of Rep. Jamie Raskin. Rep. Gerry Connolly suggested they would fight the move in court.

The lawmakers argued the agency is critical to the foreign policy and national security. Rep. Ilhan Omar, who said she benefited from USAID’s services as a child in a refugee camp, noted that “when the world interacts with Americans through programs that provide essential need, they get to see the heart and compassion of the American people.”

Crowds were gathered outside of the headquarters, which was closed for the day, with employees told in an email to remain at home.

Among those gathered and cheering the lawmakers were many USAID staffers, some holding signs about the life-saving work of the agency. Chants of “U-S-Aid” erupted shortly before the members of Congress approached the microphones.

“Watching the way that the very basis of the mission has been completely dismantled has been insane and unconscionable,” said Kristina Drye, who works as a speechwriter at the agency. “The short-term implications are that people will die.”

“These are people who don’t have time to wait,” said another official, William Lewis. “This process can’t play itself out. We need people to step up and fill the gap and help these people survive. And that’s what we try to do here. We save lives and alleviate suffering.”

The administration’s moves also drew the attention of Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican up for reelection in 2026, who told CNN on Monday evening that a complete shutdown of USAID and all its programs would be “mistake.”

“We have seen inspector general reports, whistleblower and other inputs saying some things need to change there,” Tillis said. “But at the end of day, if you just shut down every program in there, I think it’s a mistake, and it will have policy and political consequences.”

Logos and photos of its aid work have been stripped from building walls. And its website and social media accounts have gone dark, replaced with a reduced version of its webpage on the State Department’s website.

“It is the apocalypse at USAID,” one USAID official said.

Lawmakers and aid workers had been bracing for Trump to shut down the agency entirely and place it under the umbrella of the State Department, a step that appeared imminent Monday morning following Musk’s comments during a talk on X, the social media platform that he owns.

“With regards to the USAID stuff, I went over it with (the president) in detail and he agreed that we should shut it down,” Musk said in a X Spaces conversation early Monday.

CNN has reached out to the White House and USAID for comment. Trump himself affirmed his disdain for the agency and its mission of providing foreign aid during a question-and-answer session with reporters late Sunday.

“It’s been run by a bunch of radical lunatics, and we’re getting them out, and then we’ll make a decision” on its future, he told reporters at Joint Base Andrews.

USAID workers, most of whom are career government employees, were emailed shortly after midnight that they should not come into their Washington office, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.

“At the direction of Agency leadership, the USAID headquarters at the Ronald Reagan building in Washington, D.C. will be closed to Agency personnel on Monday, February 3, 2025. Agency personnel normally assigned to work at USAID headquarters will work remotely tomorrow, with the exception of personnel with essential on-site and building maintenance functions individually contacted by senior leadership,” said the email, of which CNN has obtained a copy.

Thousands of personal services contractors and civil servants lost access to email and USAID systems overnight.

The sudden chaos has left employees struggling to get any answers as they have gotten no information, officials aid. Personal services contractors, who travel on diplomatic passports and speak on behalf of the agency, are required to be given 15 days of notice before termination, but that has not happened.

Some USAID contractors who are on official work travel are suddenly stuck, some in sensitive and dangerous places, without answers of how they will get home.

A source who works in a USAID annex building, where access to the offices was still possible on Monday, told CNN that managers advised people to collect their things in case they lose access in the coming days.

“We’re all packing our things. It’s very sad,” this official said.

When asked if leaders in their department appeared to have any more information on the future of the agency’s work, the source said: “Our senior leaders have all been fired.”

Still, many USAID employees have vowed to continue their work amid the uncertainty and upheaval.

“They will come for me eventually,” said one USAID official defiantly. “But I won’t go quietly into that gentle night. … I swore an oath as a commissioned Foreign Service Officer to defend the Constitution.”

“We at USAID will not let their malignant, cold-hearted kind defeat us, excise the rule of law, or end a long tradition of compassion and generosity from the American people towards those suffering in humanitarian crises. Too many lives depend on it. Too much is at stake,” said another.

Over the weekend, two top security officials at USAID were put on administrative leave for refusing members of the Department of Government Efficiency access to systems at the agency, even when DOGE personnel threatened to call law enforcement, multiple sources familiar with the situation told CNN.

The DOGE personnel wanted to gain access to USAID security systems and personnel files, three sources said. Two of those sources also said the DOGE personnel wanted access to classified information, which only those with security clearances and a specific need to know are able to access.

Three sources told CNN that in the end, the DOGE personnel were eventually able to access the headquarters. Katie Miller, whom Trump named to DOGE in December, on Sunday appeared to confirm that DOGE personnel had accessed classified information.

“No classified material was accessed without proper security clearances,” she posted on X.

USAID workers were also informed last week that the agency’s Google Drive is now accessible from the State Department.

“We have been officially informed that the US Department of State now has access to all of our internal documents and our entire suite of files, documents, everything — all of our systems,” a USAID worker said.

Democratic congressional staffers protested Trump’s effort to dissolve USAID.

“From Congress’ perspective, this is a clear congressional prerogative to create, dissolve agencies, not the executive, and you can’t just undo by (executive order) something that is in statute,” one told CNN.

“There was a rationale for creating AID, the development agency, as its own independent agency. Because it is its own specialty or specialized area of work,” another explained. “It’s a big area of work that really demands its own kind of leadership and processes and isn’t solely related to the national security issue of any particular moment, but it’s critical to building long-term relationships and capacity in areas, such as global health, which protects Americans.”

USAID logos and photos showing the humanitarian work the agency does around the globe were removed from its offices last week, multiple sources familiar with the situation told CNN.

“All of the visuals have been taken down. These are like large-scale photos of our work in developing countries that are in our lobbies, in our galleys, in communal kitchens, hallways,” a USAID employee said. “An order also came down to individual bureaus and offices to remove all USAID artwork and signage.”

Another USAID worker told CNN: “They’ve taken the photos off the walls, and we’re missing half of our colleagues because our colleagues are gone and have been let go, and everyone sort of feels like they’re walking around with a target on their back.”

When asked if leaders in their department appeared to have any more information on the future of the agency’s work, the source said: “Our senior leaders have all been fired.”

Around 60 senior USAID staff were put on leave last week on accusations of attempting to circumvent Trump’s executive order to freeze foreign aid for 90 days. Many more junior staff and contractors within the agency have been placed on furlough as well, multiple sources told CNN.

On Saturday, USAID’s website went dark and a new page for the agency appeared on the State Department website. USAID’s X account also went offline Saturday, and a source told CNN that the entire USAID public affairs office was put on leave and locked out of their systems.

Shortly after being sworn in last month, Trump issued a sweeping executive order pausing all foreign aid for 90 days, leading to widespread confusion, layoffs and program shutdowns.

USAID was established in 1961 under President John F. Kennedy’s administration and is the US government’s humanitarian arm. It dispenses billions of dollars annually across the world in an effort to alleviate poverty, treat diseases, and respond to famines and natural disasters. It also promotes democracy building and development by supporting non-government organizations, independent media and social initiatives.

USAID is a key soft power tool of the US to foster relations with communities around the world, officials say, noting that US national security is approached with the “three D” pillars: defense, diplomacy and development, led, respectively, by the Defense Department, State Department and USAID.

This story has been updated with additional reporting and background information.

CNN’s Annie Grayer and Manu Raju contributed to this report.