With $48M in philanthropic backing, a division of USAID relaunches as a nonprofit

WASHINGTON (AP) — A division of the U.S. Agency for International Development eliminated by Trump administration cuts last year was reborn Thursday as an independent nonprofit, allowing its international work to continue in a new form.

This reincarnation of USAID’s Development Innovation Ventures as the nonprofit DIV Fund is thanks to $48 million raised from two private donors. It is a rare instance of continuation after the Trump administration froze all foreign funding last year and unleashed Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency to tear down the agency that delivered U.S. foreign aid for 60 years.

Out of that destruction, which cost tens of thousands of jobs and caused people around the world to die, many private efforts were made to preserve decades of data and knowledge housed at USAID, help recipients keep vital programs running and reimagine how international development might work.

But few of those efforts have managed to attract the kind of philanthropic funding that the DIV Fund has. Funders, previous grantees and DIV Fund staff gathered in the glass-walled penthouse of a Washington think tank as the sun set Thursday to mark the new chapter. The mood was resolved and optimistic, having found a way to continue where many efforts in international development have been derailed.

“The loss of US government support is a huge blow,” said Michael Kremer, the DIV Fund’s scientific director and a Nobel prize winning economist. "It’s wonderful that private funders have stepped up to help try to fill part of that gap but it’s only filling part of the gap.”

Some of the leaders of the new nonprofit were also involved in directing $110 million from private philanthropy in the past year to projects that lost funding from USAID. Now, the DIV Fund aims to grant out $25 million annually, which represents a little more than half of DIV's budget at USAID.

Their fundraising success has a couple of ingredients.

First, the nonprofit DIV Fund acts like a research and development hub to identify very affordable and efficient interventions and then to support their expansion to scale. As such, their budget is very small compared to programs that treat or prevent HIV or respond to famine, for example.

Then, while they were a division at USAID, DIV had already won outside philanthropic funding, including a $45 million grant from Coefficient Giving, a San Francisco-based funder that is now one of the nonprofit's anchor donors. The other funder is anonymous.

Finally, Kremer said the programs they identify generally get funding from local governments or earn revenue, rather than depending on long term funding from donor countries like the U.S. That path to sustainability is even more important in the face of major cuts to foreign assistance from multiple historic donor countries.

Of the total DIV Fund has raised so far, $20 million has been allocated to former recipients, leaving $28 million for future grants. The fund will have an open call for applications this year, a process they are devoted to because it generates many new ideas.

Within USAID, DIV would sometimes influence other departments and win additional support for projects they'd endorsed. Now, on the outside, the DIV Fund plans to work with major donors like the World Bank and other countries to take up their recommendations and develop their own similar research funds.

Otis Reid, the executive director of Global Health & Wellbeing at Coefficient Giving, said that as the overall amount of official foreign assistance shrinks, it's even more important that what remains is used in the best way.

“It just matters a ton if that money is going towards things that are highly effective or moderately effective or not effective,” he said. “And I think DIV can play a really crucial role in moving things from the not effective to very effective part of the spectrum.”

Many programs that DIV has supported are validated through randomized control trials, a specific kind of research design. Kathryn Oliver, a professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine who studies how evidence informs policy, said while these trials are valuable for answering specific kinds of questions, they cannot give policymakers all the information they need.

“It is the most robust research design for answering questions about the effectiveness of interventions compared to usual treatment, absolutely,” she said of the trials. “But it is not the most robust design for answering any other kind of questions,” like whether populations find it acceptable or how it compares to other approaches.

As a new nonprofit, the DIV Fund is open to working with the U.S. government, cofounder Sasha Gallant said.

The Secretary of State Marco Rubio has characterized USAID as corrupt, costly and ineffective and said foreign aid made governments and large nonprofits permanently dependent on the U.S. While significant amounts of foreign aid funding was cut or clawed back in 2025, Congress recently allocated $50 billion for various foreign assistance programs, significantly more than the administration had requested.

DIV had previously won bipartisan support in part because of the high return on investment that its programs offer, which can also be a very satisfying metric for philanthropic funders.

The DIV Fund won't replace funding for large programs that are already backed by extensive evidence or that may be expensive but valuable, like humanitarian responses. But Gallant said the DIV Fund strongly hopes donor countries continue to fund these other types of programs.

“We absolutely should be delivering en masse the things that increase people’s livelihoods and save their lives and keep kids in school,” she said.

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and non-profits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

Juliette Seban, the executive director at the Fund for Innovation in Development, speaks at an event Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Moriah Ratner)

Otis Reid, executive director of Global Health & Wellbeing at Coefficient Giving, poses for a portrait Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Moriah Ratner)

Jessica Vernon, founder and CEO of Maisha Meds, speaks at an event Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Moriah Ratner)

Sasha Gallant, cofounder of the DIV Fund, left, Michael Kremer, the DIV Fund's scientific director and a Nobel prize winning economist, center, and Otis Reid, executive director of Global Health & Wellbeing at Coefficient Giving, pose for a portrait Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Moriah Ratner)

Sasha Gallant, cofounder of the DIV Fund, speaks at an event Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Moriah Ratner)

WASHINGTON (AP) — A man described as a key participant in the deadly 2012 attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya, has been taken into custody to face prosecution in connection with the rampage that killed four Americans and emerged as a divisive political issue, the Justice Department said Friday.

Zubayar Al-Bakoush, identified by officials as a member of an extremist militia in Libya, had been wanted by the United States for more than a decade. He is accused in a newly unsealed indictment of joining a mob that crashed the front gates of the diplomatic mission with assault rifles and explosives, setting off hours of violence that also included deadly fires.

Al-Bakoush arrived early Friday at an airfield in Virginia after what FBI Director Kash Patel described as a “transfer of custody” and will face charges in Washington, including murder, attempted murder, arson and conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization. Al-Bakoush was to appear Friday afternoon in federal court.

The arrest is the first by President Donald Trump's current administration arising from the attack, but it is not the first time that the Justice Department as an institution has attempted to hold to account the militants believed responsible for the killings of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. Another Libyan militant alleged to be a ringleader of the attack was captured by U.S. special forces more than a decade ago and later convicted and sentenced to prison.

“We have never stopped seeking justice for that crime against our nation,” said Attorney General Pam Bondi, who announced the arrest at a news conference with Patel and U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, the top federal prosecutor in Washington, whose office will be handling the case.

The attack almost immediately became a political flashpoint in Washington as Republicans challenged President Barack Obama and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on security at the facility, the military response to the violence and the Democratic administration’s changing narrative about who was responsible and why.

A final report by a Republican-led congressional panel faulted the Obama administration for security deficiencies at the Libyan outpost and a slow response to the attack. The report, however, found no wrongdoing by Clinton. Clinton at the time dismissed the report as an echo of previous probes with no new discoveries, saying it was “time to move on.” Other Democrats denounced the Republicans’ report as “a conspiracy theory on steroids."

On the night of Sept. 11, 2012, U.S. officials have said, at least 20 militants armed with AK-47s and grenade launchers breached the gate of the consulate compound and set buildings on fire. The fire led to the deaths of Stevens, the ambassador, and State Department employee Sean Smith.

Other State Department personnel escaped to a nearby U.S. facility known as the annex.

A large group assembled for an attack on the annex. That attack, including a precision mortar barrage, resulted in the deaths of security officers Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty.

The indictment accuses Al-Bakoush of being part of the armed group that traveled to the mission. It also says he conducted surveillance and attempted to break into cars of diplomatic mission staff.

The case will be the latest prosecution in Washington to focus attention on the Benghazi attacks. Ahmed Abu Khattala, who was captured in Libya in 2014, was convicted in a jury trial and sentenced to more than two decades in prison. His attorneys argued that the evidence was inconclusive and that he was singled out because of his ultra-conservative Muslim beliefs.

Another Libyan national, Mustafa al-Imam, was captured in 2017 and was convicted two years later for his role. His attorneys argued that he had been suffering from mental trauma and seasickness when he agreed to speak with American officials aboard a U.S. Navy vessel days after his abduction.

“The Benghazi saga was a painful one for Americans,” Pirro said. “It has stayed with all of us. And let me be very clear: There are more of them out there. Time will not stop us from going after these predators no matter how long it takes in order to fulfill our obligation to those families who suffered horrific pain at the hands of these violent terrorists.”

This story has been corrected to show the suspect arrived at an airfield in Virginia, not at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland as Bondi announced.

Associated Press writer Meg Kinnard in Washington contributed to this report.

Attorney General Pam Bondi, center, flanked by FBI Director Kash Patel, left, and Jeanine Pirro, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, appears before reporters at the Justice Department, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Washington, to announce the capture of a key participant in the 2012 attack on a U.S. compound that killed four Americans in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

FILE - A burnt car sits in front of the U.S. consulate on Sept. 13, 2012, after an attack that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, on the night of Sept. 11, in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon, File)

FILE - Bloodstains, believed to be from one of the American staff members of the U.S. Consulate, are seen Sept. 13, 2012, at the main gate after an attack that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, on the night of Sept. 11, 2012, in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon, File)

FILE - Libyan military guards check one of the U.S. Consulate's burnt-out buildings, Sept. 14, 2012, during a visit by Libyan President Mohammed el-Megarif, not pictured, to the U.S. Consulate to express sympathy for the death of American ambassador Chris Stevens and his colleagues after the deadly attack on the Consulate on Sept. 11, in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon, File)

FILE - The U.S. Department of Justice logo is seen on a podium before a press conference, May 6, 2025, at the Justice Department in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)

FILE - Glass, debris and overturned furniture are strewn inside a room in the gutted U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, after an attack that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens., Sept. 12, 2012. (AP Photo/Ibrahim Alaguri, File)