Lawyers for the government had said it would miss a deadline to release more than $1.5 billion in payments for past aid work and sought a late intervention from the Supreme Court.

Chief Justice John Roberts on Wednesday paused a court-imposed midnight deadline that would have required the Trump administration to release $2 billion in frozen foreign aid, a goal that the government has claimed it is unable to meet.

President Donald Trump's administration asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to put on hold a federal judge's order requiring the government to pay foreign aid funds to contractors and grant recipients for past work.