U.S. will exit dozens of international organizations

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The Trump administration will withdraw from dozens of international organizations, including the U.N.‘s population agency and the U.N. treaty that establishes international climate negotiations, as the U.S. further retreats from global cooperation.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order suspending U.S. support for 66 organizations, agencies and commissions following his instructions for his administration to review participation in and funding for all international organizations, including those affiliated with the United Nations, according to a White House statement on social media.

Most of the targets are U.N.-related agencies, commissions and advisory panels that focus on climate, labor and other issues that the Trump administration has categorized as catering to diversity and “woke” initiatives, according to a partial list obtained by The Associated Press.

“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,” the State Department said in a statement.

Trump’s decision to withdraw from organizations that foster cooperation among nations to address global challenges comes as his administration has launched military efforts or issued threats that have rattled allies and adversaries alike, including capturing autocratic Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and indicating an intention to take over Greenland.

This is the latest U.S. withdrawal from global agencies
The administration previously suspended support from agencies like the World Health Organization, the U.N. for Palestinian refugees known as UNRWA, the U.N. Human Rights Council and the U.N. cultural agency UNESCO as it has taken a larger, a-la-carte approach to paying its dues to the world body, picking which operations and agencies they believe align with Trump’s agenda and those which no longer serve U.S. interests.

“I think what we’re seeing is the crystallization of the U.S. approach to multilateralism, which is ‘my way or the highway,’” said Daniel Forti, head of U.N. affairs at the International Crisis Group. “It’s a very clear vision of wanting international cooperation on Washington’s own terms.”

It has marked a major shift from how previous administrations — both Republican and Democratic — have dealt with the U.N., and it has forced the world body, already undergoing its own internal reckoning, to respond with a series of staffing and program cuts.

Many independent nongovernmental agencies — some that work with the United Nations — have cited many project closures because of the U.S. administration’s decision last year to slash foreign assistance through the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID.

Despite the massive shift, the U.S. officials, including Trump himself, say they have seen the potential of the U.N. and want to instead focus taxpayer money on expanding American influence in many of the standard-setting U.N. initiatives where there is competition with China, like the International Telecommunications Union, the International Maritime Organization and the International Labor Organization.

The global organizations from which the U.S. is departing
The withdrawal from the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, or UNFCCC, is the latest effort by Trump and his allies to distance the U.S. from international organizations focused on climate and addressing climate change.

UNFCC, the 1992 agreement between 198 countries to financially support climate change activities in developing countries, is the underlying treaty for the landmark Paris climate agreement. Trump — who calls climate change a hoax — withdrew from that agreement soon after reclaiming the White House.

Mainstream scientists say climate change is behind increasing instances of deadly and costly extreme weather, including flooding, droughts, wildfires, intense rainfall events and dangerous heat.

The U.S. withdrawal could hinder global efforts to curb greenhouse gases because it “gives other nations the excuse to delay their own actions and commitments,” said Stanford University climate scientist Rob Jackson, who chairs the Global Carbon Project, a group of scientists that tracks countries’ carbon dioxide emissions.

It also will be difficult to achieve meaningful progress on climate change without cooperation from the U.S., one of the world’s largest emitters and economies, experts said.

The U.N.‘s population agency, which provides sexual and reproductive health across the world, has long been a lightning rod for Republican opposition and Trump himself cut funding for the agency during his first term in office. He and other GOP officials have accused the agency of participating in “coercive abortion practices” in countries like China.

When President Joe Biden took office in January 2021, he restored funding for the agency. A State Department review conducted the following year found no evidence to support these claims.

Other organizations and agencies that the U.S. will quit include the Carbon Free Energy Compact, the United Nations University, the International Cotton Advisory Committee, the International Tropical Timber Organization, the Partnership for Atlantic Cooperation, the Pan-American Institute for Geography and History, the International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies and the International Lead and Zinc Study Group.

President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the U.S. from international organizations affiliated with the United Nations leaves the country without a meaningful voice in global climate talks.

The withdrawal is an escalation of the U.S.’ rejection of climate diplomacy under Trump, further isolating the country from the global aim of slowing warming and staving off the most catastrophic effects of climate change.

Trump began the process of pulling the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement in January 2025. The accord, signed in 2016, stipulated that the 195 participating nations would work to limit greenhouse gas emissions to ensure that the planet wouldn’t warm more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), with an upper limit of 2 degrees C.

The UNFCCC created the underlying structure that the Paris Agreement later built upon. It was established in 1992 to inventory and begin to address the primary sources of greenhouse gas pollution. President George Bush signed the treaty after the Senate delivered its consent in a two-thirds vote.

If the U.S. completes its exit from the UNFCCC — a process that takes a year — it would be the first country ever to do so. Re-entering the UNFCCC treaty would require a new two-thirds vote from the Senate, so Trump’s withdrawal could make it difficult for a future president to rejoin the Paris Agreement.

Withdrawing from the UNFCCC would also leave the U.S. as one of the only nations without representation at international climate talks. Already, the White House declined to send an official delegation to the latest U.N. climate summit, COP30, in Brazil last fall.

When you look at all these conventions and the history of participation, even when countries were not really actively engaged in negotiations, it’s pretty astonishing to walk away from the table and have decisions taken without your input,” said Kristie Ebi, a climate scientist at the University of Washington who has contributed to several Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports.

Previous U.S. administrations have not always been enthusiastic participants in international climate discussions, Ebi added, but they still kept tabs on them.

“People showed up, sat in the back and did crossword puzzles and never said a word, but they wanted to hear what the discussions were,” she said. Now, “it’s isolation.”

The Trump administration has expressed open hostility for the UNFCCC and other international organizations. In a statement on X, Secretary of State Marco Rubio called them “anti-American, useless or wasteful.”

The U.S. will officially exit the Paris Agreement on Jan. 27 — roughly a year after the Trump administration initiated the nation’s exit from the deal.

However, legal questions remain as to whether Trump has the power to exit the UNFCCC without Congress’ consent.

Jean Su, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity who directs its energy justice program, said her organization views the move as illegal.

“The Constitution has articulated what it takes to get into a treaty, which is two-thirds of the Senate majority, but it is actually silent on what it takes to leave a treaty,” Su said. “There has not been affirmative case law either way as to whether a president can unilaterally pull out of a treaty that was approved by two-thirds of the Senate. So we are looking at legal action.”

The UNFCCC is the world’s facilitator of global climate negotiations. Each year, a host country organizes a Conference of the Parties (COP), in which all participating nations meet to discuss things like emission targets and how to fund climate action globally. Last year’s meeting focused, in part, on the Amazon rainforest and how to address deforestation and climate effects there. The UNFCCC secretariat helps organize these events, creating a structure and facilitating the meetings.

“It’s like hosting the Olympics — you don’t do that without the organization to help,” Ebi said.

When the U.S. left the Paris Agreement, it created a budget hole for the UNFCCC. Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charity organization of former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, stepped in to fill that gap and keep the secretariat operating.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), meanwhile, is an independent body designed to provide policymakers with the best science about climate change, its effects and how it could be addressed. This organization’s reports form the scientific understanding for UNFCCC discussions and treaties.

In a statement, Simon Stiell, executive secretary of the UNFCCC, said Trump’s exit “will leave the US less secure and less prosperous.”

“The doors remain open for the US to reenter in the future, as it has in the past with the Paris Agreement,” he added.

Throughout his first year in office, Trump has made climate programs a target of dramatic budget cuts. He has called climate change a “con job,” and the administration has taken steps to scuttle or downplay key climate reports, including the National Climate Assessment. It is working to remove the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate the greenhouse gas pollution that causes global warming.