US To Withdraw From 66 International Bodies, Treaties
The Trump administration withdrew the United States from 66 international organizations, conventions, and treaties that it said go against the country’s interests, the White House announced on Jan. 7.
According to the presidential memorandum, 31 entities were tied to the United Nations, while 35 others were not.
“The Trump Administration has found these institutions to be redundant in their scope, mismanaged, unnecessary, wasteful, poorly run, captured by the interests of actors advancing their own agendas contrary to our own, or a threat to our nation’s sovereignty, freedoms, and general prosperity,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote in a statement shortly after the list was revealed.
“President [Donald] Trump is clear: It is no longer acceptable to be sending these institutions the blood, sweat, and treasure of the American people, with little to nothing to show for it. The days of billions of dollars in taxpayer money flowing to foreign interests at the expense of our people are over.”
As Jacki Thrapp reports for The Epoch Times,The State Department was ordered to review the international intergovernmental organizations that “no longer serve American interests” in February 2025, per an executive order signed by President Donald Trump.
Rubio accused many entities of being “often dominated by progressive ideology and detached from national interests.”
“From DEI mandates to ‘gender equity’ campaigns to climate orthodoxy, many international organizations now serve a globalist project rooted in the discredited fantasy of the ‘End of History.’
“These organizations actively seek to constrain American sovereignty. Their work is advanced by the same elite networks—the multilateral ‘NGO-plex’—that we have begun dismantling through the closure of [the United States Agency for International Development].”
The U.N.-related entities that the Trump administration withdrew from include the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, International Law Commission, International Trade Centre, Peacebuilding Commission, Peacebuilding Fund, U.N. Democracy Fund, U.N. Energy, U.N. Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, and U.N. University.
The non-U.N. organizations included the 24/7 Carbon-Free Energy Compact and the Commission for Environmental Cooperation.
The memorandum cited over two dozen “hybrid threats,” such as the Forum of European National Highway Research Laboratories and the Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund.
Wednesday’s memorandum came less than a year after Trump withdrew the United States from the UN Human Rights Council.
On Feb. 4, 2025, the same day the White House assigned Rubio to investigate the international organizations, Trump signed an executive order exiting from the U.N. Human Rights Council. At the time, Trump said it “has not fulfilled its purpose and continues to be used as a protective body for countries committing horrific human rights violations.”
The White House expanded on those issues, such as allowing China and Iran to be in the council despite their violations, and alleged there was bias against Israel.