In a major step toward restoring U.S. sovereignty, President Donald Trump has ordered the United States’ withdrawal from 66 international organizations.
On Wednesday, Trump signed a memorandum titled “Withdrawing the United States from International Organizations, Conventions, and Treaties that Are Contrary to the Interests of the United States,” which directs his administration to “take immediate steps to effectuate the withdrawal of the United States” from 66 international organizations that, according to a White House press release, “operate contrary to U.S. national interests, security, economic prosperity, or sovereignty.”
The affected international organizations include 31 entities affiliated with the United Nations, including the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, International Law Commission, Peacebuilding Commission, UN Democracy Fund, UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, UN Population Fund, and UN Register of Conventional Arms. It also includes 35 international organizations not directly affiliated with the UN, including the 24/7 Carbon-Free Energy Compact, Commission for Environmental Cooperation, Global Forum on Migration and Development, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, and Partnership for Atlantic Cooperation.
In a statement, Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared:
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. President 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.
Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General António Guterres issued a statement expressing disappointment for Trump’s memorandum and declaring, “The United Nations has a responsibility to deliver for those who depend on us. We will continue to carry out our mandates with determination.”
Previous Administration Actions
Trump’s memorandum is not his or his administration’s first action to withdraw the United States from international organizations or reject UN initiatives. The memorandum actually follows up from an executive order that Trump signed on February 4, 2025, withdrawing the United States from the UN Human Rights Council, defunding the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), and reviewing U.S. membership in the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) specifically and all other international organizations generally. (On July 22, the State Department announced the United States’ withdrawal from UNESCO.)
Additionally, on Trump’s first day back in office, he signed executive orders withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization (WHO) and Paris Agreement, as well as a memorandum threatening to oppose the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Global Tax Deal. And in July 2025, the Rubio and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. announced the United States’ formal rejection of the WHO’s 2024 amendments to the International Health Regulations, ensuring they would have no force or effect in the country.
Other Trump administration actions include pausing funding for the World Trade Organization (WTO), forcing the UN’s International Maritime Organization to pause a proposed global tax on shipping, and — for the first time — formally denouncing the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Wednesday’s memorandum, however, arguably is the administration’s most significant action yet — and the most significant action since the United States helped found the UN in 1945 — to reassert U.S. sovereignty and push back against globalist organizations that threaten American independence and promote collectivist and globalist policies.
Mixed Messages
Despite these actions, Trump has also expressed support for a strengthened UN. For example, at his address to the UN General Assembly on September 23, 2025, he implied support for a more powerful UN system, declaring that the globalist body “has such tremendous, tremendous potential, but it’s not even coming close to living up to that potential. For the most part, at least for now, all they seem to do is write a really strongly worded letter and then never follow that letter up. It’s empty words and empty words don’t solve war.”
Trump also expressed support for “enforc[ing] the Biological Weapons Convention” and expressed his hope that “the UN can play a constructive role” in this effort. And following his address, Trump told Guterres during a meeting that “our country is behind the United Nations 100 percent.”
In November 2025, Trump praised the UN Security Council for voting to create a Board of Peace, which he claimed he would chair, to oversee the peace process in Gaza. He has also repeatedly expressed support for NATO — a subsidiary of the United Nations — including Article 5, which obliges the United States to go to war if another NATO member is attacked.
These statements indicate that despite Trump’s actions opposing the UN and other international organizations, he is not fundamentally opposed to them, and even supports granting them greater power over member states. For this reason, it is essential that Congress enact legislation to permanently withdraw the United States from all international organizations, and that ordinary Americans persistently advocate for U.S. sovereignty.
Get US Out!
Legislation has been introduced in Congress to get the United States out of the entire UN system. The Disengaging Entirely From the United Nations Debacle (DEFUND) Act of 2025 (H.R. 1498 and S. 669) is sponsored by Representative Chip Roy (R-Texas) and Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah). The House companion currently has 17 co-sponsors, while the Senate companion has two co-sponsors. If enacted, the DEFUND Act would fully withdraw the United States from all UN entities, completely defund the globalist body, and prevent the U.S. president from unilaterally rejoining it.
Although the DEFUND Act is the most comprehensive legislation, other bills to withdraw the United States from international organizations have been introduced, including:
- H.R. 54, the WHO Withdrawal Act, sponsored by Representative Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), which would codify Trump’s order withdrawing the United States from the WHO;
- House Joint Resolution 93, sponsored by Representative Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.), which would withdraw the United States from the WTO; and
- H.R. 6508 and S. 2174, the Not A Trusted Organization (NATO) Act, sponsored by Representative Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Lee, respectively, which would withdraw the United States from NATO.
Enacting any of these bills would amount to a major restoration of American independence from the grip of globalism.
To ensure that Congress votes on these bills, it is essential that ordinary Americans take vigilant, concerted action by persistently calling and meeting with their U.S. representatives and senators and educating their fellow citizens about the need to Get US Out! of the UN and other international organizations. It’s ultimately up to us — through building an educated electorate — to ensure that our leaders uncompromisingly defend our Republic and God-given freedoms.
To urge your U.S. representative and senators to Get US Out! of the United Nations, visit The John Birch Society’s legislative alert here. To urge them to Get US Out! of the WHO, WTO, and NATO, visit the respective JBS legislative alerts here, here, and here.
