Trump Signs Memorandum Pulling U.S. Out of 66 International Organizations

Great-power ambivalence toward multilateralism is not new: in 1919 the U.S. Senate rejected Woodrow Wilson’s League of Nations covenant, and in 1984 Ronald Reagan pulled the U.S. from UNESCO, only to re-enter two decades later. Trump’s 2026 mass withdrawal continues that pendulum, but at unprecedented scale, underscoring a century-long tension between sovereignty-first politics and the post-1945 rules-based order Washington itself built. Strategically, the move accelerates a shift already visible since the 2003 Iraq invasion and the 2017 Paris exit: major powers now treat global bodies à la carte, funding only those that align with immediate interests. Over a 100-year horizon, this moment could either be a blip—like the 1920s isolationism that ended with World War II—or a tipping point where fragmented, issue-specific coalitions replace universal institutions, leaving vacuums China, India and private networks may fill. Whether climate governance, public-health coordination and standard-setting can survive without sustained U.S. engagement will shape the efficacy—and legitimacy—of multilateralism for generations.