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The dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development has taken a devastating toll, with more than 750,000 lives already lost—most of them children—due to the cuts, and far worse yet to come. The reckless destruction of USAID stands out as one of the most costly decisions of the Trump administration to date. That decision, however, does not have to be a permanent one.

I was the top global health official at USAID, and my new book, Into the Wood Chipper, takes readers inside the mayhem to expose the jaw-dropping ignorance, indifference, and cruelty of DOGE and Donald Trump’s appointees as they eviscerated one of America’s best ideas in a few short weeks. But it wasn’t solely Elon Musk’s chain saw that killed a congressionally mandated federal agency that had enjoyed broad bipartisan support for more than six decades. Congress abdicated its constitutional authority. Lawmakers merely watched as the administration ignored and violated the laws it had passed to establish and fund USAID. Too many stood silent for too long.

As the midterm elections approach, Americans cannot allow their representatives to make the same mistake again. Now is the time for candidates seeking election to pledge to enter office with an actionable plan to rapidly and immediately rebuild USAID. This is especially important—and it should be a prerequisite for any candidate who wants to be the Democratic nominee for president in 2028. (For what it’s worth, it should be a prerequisite for any presidential candidate from either party, but in the current political environment, that seems unlikely.)

This should be an easy promise for anyone seeking office. The case for USAID is both unequivocal and overwhelmingly popular. The agency was one of the best investments across the entire government. On less than 1 percent of the federal budget, USAID saved 92 million lives around the world in the past two decades alone. And it made Americans safer too. The agency helped countries develop early warning systems to ensure that infectious disease outbreaks were rapidly........

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