February 4, 2026 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced Tuesday that it is now operating the foreign food aid program Food for Peace and that it is moving quickly to get the program back on track to deliver “lifesaving food assistance.”

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) formerly operated Food for Peace, but soon after taking office last year, President Donald Trump dismantled the agency. A skeleton crew left managing the food aid programs moved to the Department of State.

In a press release, the USDA said it is implementing Food for Peace under an inter-agency agreement with USAID and suggested it would do the same for the McGovern-Dole Food for Education Program, which supports school meals in low-income countries.

The programs are popular with members of Congress on both sides of the aisle, because they allocate billions of dollars annually for buying crops from American farmers. As the Trump administration dismantled USAID, lawmakers led by Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kansas) saved funding for those programs.

Moran is among a group of lawmakers who previously introduced legislation to move the program to the USDA. In a press release Tuesday, they applauded the announcement and said they would continue to work to make the move permanent.

“Allowing USDA to administer the Food for Peace program equips American producers to serve hungry people while providing more transparency and efficiency as to how taxpayer dollars are stewarded,” Representative Tracey Mann (R-Kansas) said in the release.

However, in a House hearing today, Representative Sanford Bishop (D-Alabama) said Food for Peace was one of several programs members of Congress are worried could suffer in the wake of significant reorganization and staffing cuts at the USDA. “We have questions regarding the department’s plans for staffing, program execution, and stewardship of the funding this committee provides,” he said.

In its statement, the USDA said it is initially spending up to $452 million in funds that were allocated to fiscal year 2025 to buy 211,000 tons of bulk agricultural commodities and that additional purchases will be announced as more funding becomes available.

More than a billion dollars in funds allocated to the program for fiscal year 2025 were carried over because they were not spent. While some carryover is typical, it’s generally about a quarter of that. The USDA also has another billion dollars in new appropriations to spend. (Link to this post.)

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