The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has directed its staff in Washington to shred and burn documents, according to an email obtained by NBC News. The order comes as the Trump administration faces legal challenges over its efforts to shut down the agency.

An internal email from Erica Carr, USAID’s acting executive secretary, set the document destruction for Tuesday. The message thanked employees for their “assistance in clearing our classified safes and personnel documents.”

🚨🚨 THIS IS A 5-ALARM FIRE 🚨🚨 Right now, as we speak, today, USAID is shredding and burning the contents of the agency's classified safes — the key information needed to reconstruct the history of USAID's weaponization both at home and abroad. THIS MUST BE STOPPED pic.twitter.com/G4uEuUY0yd

— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) March 11, 2025

“Shred as many documents first, and reserve the burn bags for when the shredder becomes unavailable or needs a break,” Carr wrote.

Destroying classified materials can occur in emergencies, but former employees and a foreign service workers’ group have raised concerns that this directive is inappropriate.

Legal groups fighting the administration’s move to close USAID filed an emergency motion Tuesday to stop the destruction.

“Defendants are, as this motion is being filed, destroying documents with potential pertinence to this litigation,” the motion stated.

Mike Benz, a longtime critic of USAID, called the situation a “five-alarm fire,” stating, “Right now, as we speak, today, USAID is shredding and burning the contents of the agency’s classified safes—the key information needed to reconstruct the history of USAID’s weaponization both at home and abroad. THIS MUST BE STOPPED!”

A Trump administration official said three dozen employees received the email and that the documents being destroyed were “courtesy content”—materials provided to USAID by other agencies.

At a time when USAID's past history is most under the gun and most important to PUBLISH PUBLICLY, what possible benign reason could there be for mass shredding of paper documents, classified safes & personnel info? Why is there no official public communication about the reason? https://t.co/1g6GPtcztL

— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) March 11, 2025

“Although Plaintiffs do not know at this moment which records are being destroyed, the destruction of records may severely undermine the agency’s ability to function. For example, destruction of records that contain information about the agency’s operations may make it extraordinarily difficult—if not impossible—to recreate and rebuild agency programming” if the lawsuit succeeds, the motion continued.

U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, overseeing the case, did not immediately rule on the request. He ordered both sides to submit a status report by Wednesday and propose a schedule for next steps.

A Trump administration official defended the document destruction, saying, “No documents relevant to litigation are classified—therefore, they are not part of this directive. They are clearing out their building because it’ll be used by Customs and Border Patrol.”

The official also said, “These are very old documents. They are in complete compliance with the Federal Records Act of 1950. Everyone involved in this process had a secret clearance or higher and was approved by the bureau of the documents that they were handling. A majority of the content is courtesy content. Most original copies are still in classified computer systems.”