U.S. Department of State

Overview

The U.S. Department of State is the oldest of the federal executive departments. It was established as the Department of Foreign Affairs by an act of July 27, 1789, and received its present name by an act of September 15, 1789 (National Archives). It is responsible for planning and implementing American foreign policy, and the Secretary of State is the President’s chief adviser for foreign affairs (National Archives). The department is currently led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio (NPR).

The reorganization nobody announced — then the one they did

In April 2025, the department went through two reorganizations in the space of two days: one it disowned, one it owned. On April 20, Government Executive obtained a draft executive order circulating inside the department that would have ended the career diplomatic corps in its current nonpartisan form (Government Executive). The draft would have scrapped the Foreign Service Officer Test and set new hiring guidelines calling for “demonstrated charisma,” “verbal authenticity,” and “diplomatic appearance,” plus alignment with the president’s foreign policy vision — with any hiring requiring White House sign-off (Government Executive). Career officers, who serve as generalists accepting assignments worldwide, would have been remade as regional specialists serving only in designated areas (Government Executive).

The draft’s other provisions were sweeping: closing the Africa bureau and replacing it with a Special Envoy Office for African Affairs reporting to the White House; eliminating offices covering climate, oceans and scientific affairs, foreign assistance, public diplomacy and public affairs, security coordination, education and cultural affairs, democracy and human rights, refugees and migration, and global criminal justice; and creating a Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs to subsume the duties of USAID, which the administration had effectively shuttered (Government Executive). It set an aggressive October 1 deadline and capped buyout and early-retirement offers at around 2,700 employees (Government Executive). After the document reached reporters — The New York Times also reported on it — Rubio called it “fake news” and said the paper had fallen for a “hoax,” while a department spokesperson did not address any of its specific contents (Government Executive). Multiple sources traced the document to Pete Marocco, a former political appointee Rubio had fired the previous week who had overseen the dismantling of USAID (Government Executive). The American Foreign Service Association, which represents Foreign Service officers, said the leak had done damage regardless: “Reorganization of the State Department by leaks and confusion isn’t a strategy — it’s a recipe for failure” (Government Executive).

Two days later came the official version. On April 22, Rubio announced he was cutting about 700 positions and 132 offices, calling the bureaucracy “bloated” (NPR). He moved the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor — which Congress requires to exist — under the Coordinator for Foreign Assistance, and abolished the Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Human Rights and Democracy, which had overseen several offices now being closed (NPR). One casualty was the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations, created after the Bush administration’s war in Iraq (NPR). The department planned to cut about 15 percent of its personnel, with reduction-in-force notices to go out later; spokesperson Tammy Bruce insisted “no one is going to be walking out of the building” that day (NPR). Senator Jeanne Shaheen, the ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, warned that “when America retreats — as it has under President Trump — China and Russia fill the void” (NPR). The remnants of USAID would be folded into the department with more oversight from regional bureaus, though the plan did not address the overseas footprint — even as proposals seen by NPR suggested cuts of around two dozen consulates and embassies (NPR).

The nearly $2 billion the courts fought over

The department spent much of 2025 litigating money it was told to pay. After a January 20 executive order froze foreign assistance, U.S. District Judge Amir Ali ordered the administration to pay nearly $2 billion owed to partners of USAID and the State Department, giving it a Monday deadline to repay the nonprofit groups and businesses suing over the funding freeze (Associated Press). Ali called a partial payment a “concrete” first step he wanted to see (Associated Press). During a four-hour hearing, he pressed the government’s lawyer on the claim that presidents can override Congress on spending: “It would be an ‘earth-shaking, country-shaking proposition to say that appropriations are optional,’” he said, asking, “where are you getting this from in the constitutional document?” (Associated Press).

The plaintiffs — the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition, the Global Health Council, and others — were seeking back payment for their share of the nearly $2 billion owed when the freeze hit (Associated Press). By then the administration had replaced the blanket freeze with what it called individualized determinations, cancelling 5,800 USAID contracts — more than 90 percent of the agency’s project contracts — and 4,100 State Department grants, totaling nearly $60 billion in aid (Associated Press). “The funding freeze, it’s not continuing. It’s over,” a government lawyer told the court, while the administration said payment processing was slowed because it had pulled most USAID workers off their jobs (Associated Press). Ali noted the agency had said it routinely made thousands of payments before the shutdown and had called 100 staffers off leave to process them (Associated Press). The ruling came a day after a divided Supreme Court rejected the administration’s bid to freeze the funding and instructed Ali to clarify what the government must do to comply (Associated Press).

The victory for the aid groups did not survive the summer. On August 13, 2025, a 2-1 panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit lifted the injunction requiring the department to keep making foreign aid payments, ruling that a lower court had erred in ordering the restoration of congressionally approved assistance (NPR). Writing for the majority, Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson — joined by Judge Gregory Katsas — said the grantees “lack a cause of action to press their claims” and had failed to satisfy the requirements for a preliminary injunction; only the Government Accountability Office could challenge the withholding (NPR). The court pointedly did not decide whether the freeze violated the Constitution by infringing Congress’s spending power, and Judge Florence Pan dissented (NPR). The money at issue by then included nearly $4 billion for global health programs and more than $6 billion for HIV and AIDS programs, from an agency that had managed about $30 billion a year before its dismantling (NPR).

What this profile does not claim

This profile does not state Rubio’s confirmation date or vote, since no source read in full for it confirmed those details. It reports the April 2025 draft executive order only as a disavowed leak — the department called it fake, and this profile does not treat its contents as policy. It does not give current headcount or office totals after the reorganization, which were not verified. It does not say how much of the nearly $2 billion was ultimately paid following the August 2025 appellate reversal. It takes no position on whether the reorganization or the aid freeze was lawful or wise; it reports what the department did and what the courts decided.