AITA for trying to get a single mom fired?

Hi everyone! I think I am not in the wrong but I feel kind of guilty, also sorry for the very long post.

First a little bit of context, I (F28) work in a political organization in my country where most are volunteers, but there is a small set of people who are paid employees. I am currently in charge of overseeing a section that has both.

At the beginning of the year when my organization began operations I was really clear with everyone on the team that not everyone was going to be in a paid role, but that we were trying our best to get everyone some support and to eventually pay most of the team. Our team agreed on a list of who would get paid first when the opportunity was available.

There was this very particular member, let’s call her Anna (26), that had a harsh context. She is a single mom that lives in an underprivileged part of the city. She was a dedicated and talented member. One day she told me that she lost her main source of income and that she was going to need to look for another job, which meant that she didn`t know if she was still going to be able to work as a volunteer in my team.

Knowing this, and considering the work she had done, I made the decision to skip the list (the other members reluctantly agreed) and try to find her a paid role. Surprisingly I was able to offer her a paid role just below my pay bracket.

For about 8 months everything went well and the team tried to support her in every way we could. For example I allowed her to do home office one day a week as that day no one could pick up her kid (M 6). She brought her kid to work and non work commitments and even when she made a mistake that cost hundreds of dollars I lent her the money so she would not get in trouble.

Through these months the organization started having some financial problems. Which caused most paychecks to be very late, I could not do much to support her but at least at this point she had gained two other small gigs that at least provided her some income.

Things started to get complicated. She had issues with almost every member of the team. I trayed talking the issues out with the intention of everyone being comfortable. When she had issues with me I took her out once for coffee and once for lunch so that we could talk and both make changes to our behaviour.

Her behaviour escalated. She was being rude to the volunteers across the country. She would ignore me when she got mad at something. When a member of the team tried to give a different one more responsibility, she accused him of only doing so because he wanted to sleep with her. She shit talked some of the leaders with lies that she spread around, she also spread private conversations manipulating what was said to create conflict. She spent most of her time in the office playing games on her Ipad. I was stuned when I learned that she had brought a guy over to the shared office to have sex.

I did not know how to talk to her anymore, but the most stupid fight was what sent her over the edge. I was giving free debate training to the team. She was debating and got distracted doing something else from her other job. When it was her turn she asked us to wait, the debate had only 2 minutes left, we did wait for about ten minutes though. After that as a joke I said ‘Everyone look at Anna till she finishes’ so that we could finish the exercise and get back to work (we have a very joky dynamic). She yelled at me ‘I don't care if you look at me, at least for this I get paid.’ (the paycheck was very late) I answered ‘it is not about you getting paid to learn, im giving you something for free that I usually charge’ She yelled again, I paused the exercise and left telling them calmly that I would see them tomorrow.

Later that evening I got a text saying that she did not feel comfortable in the team anymore. That decisions were being made unilaterally and that I was praising some people's work over others. From her text I understood that she was quitting and quite honestly I felt relieved. So I just thanked her for her time, wished her luck on future endeavors and asked her to hand over the things that only she had. I already knew who was going to take on her paycheck and responsibilities.

The next day she showed up to the office and started helping out another team. I was shocked. I gathered the leaders together and with my team told them about the situation. They spoke with her and apparently she was not quitting, just quitting my team. The thing is I need to pay someone else to take on her responsibilities. So I can't afford to lose that money for my team, especially as many have been waiting for over a year as volunteers. So I asked the leadership to let her go, and they told me they couldn’t because she is a single mom and we owe her money.

Her spot on the payroll was gained through the amazing work that everyone on the team did, and through the financial crisis it was maintained because of the same reason. I think that it is unfair for the decision of one person to hurt an entire team.

My position is that she quit the job she was hired to do, so she would not be fired, she had already quit. They say that it can be viewed as asking for a reassignment. I feel that the situation is unfair and that I have to fight for that spot, but am I the asshole?