USAID officials – A congressional account says USAID funding and access to protective equipment were frozen during an Ebola response in Uganda, while a senior official described Ebola as a “scam” because there had been “one death.” The State Department disputes any link to dela
For a country fighting an Ebola outbreak, timing is everything. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda. the crisis is now one of the largest in recent history—nearly 1. 000 suspected cases and more than 200 suspected deaths. according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The disease is spreading quickly. and public health workers say they’ve struggled to contain it after funds for the U.S. Agency for International Development and other aid efforts were cut by the Trump administration.
The dispute is now playing out in competing accounts of responsibility—one centered on budget decisions from Washington, the other insisting those cuts had nothing to do with delays.
The U.S. State Department says President Donald Trump’s cuts did not contribute to the delayed response. Tommy Pigott, a spokesman, told the New York Times last week, “It is false to claim that the USAID reform has negatively impacted our ability to respond to Ebola.”
But a separate record inside the government paints a far harsher picture. In March 2025. Nicholas Enrich—then an acting assistant administrator for global health at USAID—testified before Congress that funding had been frozen. He said protective equipment could not be accessed. and that an agency leader characterized an Ebola outbreak in Uganda as a “scam.”.
Enrich told the U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs that in February. his requests for funds to address Uganda’s ongoing Ebola outbreak had fallen on deaf ears. He said Tim Meisburger. who was then head of USAID’s Bureau of Humanitarian Assistance. “specifically noted that Ebola was a ‘scam’ because there had only been ‘one death.’” Enrich testified that he tried to explain Ebola was still in an incubation period and that the response needed to continue.
His testimony describes a meeting that ended not with reassurance, but with a narrowing of priorities. Enrich said his superiors decided to “deprioritize activities related to neglected tropical diseases, MPox, Polio, Ebola, and any monitoring and surveillance activities.”
The contrast between the State Department’s denial and Enrich’s account is sharp. One side says the reforms did not impede the ability to respond. The other describes frozen funding, blocked access to protective equipment, and a decision to deprioritize Ebola and related monitoring.
What makes Enrich’s testimony especially consequential is that it names the official at the center of the “scam” remark—Meisburger. And it places that remark inside a broader shift at USAID, tied to other diseases and surveillance work.
Meisburger has been at the center of controversy before. In 2021. the Washington Post reported that while he was serving as a deputy assistant administrator at USAID’s Bureau for Development. Democracy and Innovation. he told fellow staffers during a video call that the January 6 Capitol insurrection was caused by “a few violent people. ” while “several million” others had been protesting peacefully. He was dismissed after the comments came to light, but later returned to public office during Trump’s second term.
Enrich’s testimony also described who was present. He said the other high-ranking official in the meeting was an assistant to the administrator for global health, Mark Lloyd. Lloyd, Enrich said, has a history of controversial statements.
When Lloyd was named USAID’s religious freedom adviser at the end of Trump’s first term in 2020. the Washington Post reported that he had made Islamophobic comments on social media. including calling Islam a “barbaric cult.” As of June 2025. the report said Meisburger had taken a new role with the Peace Corps. while Lloyd remained with USAID’s Bureau of Global Health. The agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The dispute over Ebola’s delayed response also runs alongside a more public fight over USAID itself. Around the same time that Enrich was meeting with Meisburger and Lloyd. SpaceX head Elon Musk—then leading Trump’s U.S. Department of Government Efficiency—took to X in February to brag about gutting USAID. “We spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper,” he tweeted. “Could gone to some great parties. Did that instead.”.
The picture that emerges from these facts is not just about an outbreak—it’s about how decisions inside the same government can be interpreted so differently from one spokesperson to another, and how internal testimony about Ebola response priorities sits in tension with official denials.
Right now, the stakes are immediate in the field. With nearly 1. 000 suspected cases and more than 200 suspected deaths across the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda. any slowdown in funding. equipment. or prioritization can mean fewer barriers between exposure and spread. Enrich’s account describes a moment when Ebola was met with internal skepticism and funding constraints. Pigott’s statement insists the cuts were not to blame. The gap between those two versions is where the anger—and the urgency—now lives.
Ebola Democratic Republic of the Congo Uganda USAID Nicholas Enrich Tim Meisburger Mark Lloyd Tommy Pigott Donald Trump State Department Congress House Committee on Foreign Affairs Peace Corps Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Elon Musk