Aid agencies operating in Yemen were caught off guard by President Joe Biden’s recent comment that he is considering redesignating the Houthi movement as a terrorist organization, an action that relief workers say would compound the already dire humanitarian crisis in the Arab world’s poorest country. 

The United Arab Emirates has urged the United States to classify the Iran-backed group as a foreign terrorist organization following the Houthis' deadly drone and missile attack on Abu Dhabi earlier this week. The Emirati ambassador to the United States, Yousef Al-Otaiba, recommended the Houthis’ blacklisting during a meeting with US national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Wednesday.

The Trump administration designated the Houthis in January 2021 despite months of appeals from aid groups who said the terror label would complicate the delivery of aid and commercial imports into war-torn Yemen, much of which is under the Houthis’ de facto control. 

At the time, several now-members of the Biden administration took issue with former President Donald Trump’s 11th-hour designation, including Sullivan, who said the labeling would “inflict more suffering on Yemeni people and impede diplomacy.” The State Department revoked the terror designation of Houthis, also known as Ansar Allah, within the first month of Biden’s presidency in a decision spokesperson Ned Price said had “nothing to do” with the rebels’ “reprehensible conduct.”