Staff Reports
America has officially reclaimed its health sovereignty — the United States completed its withdrawal from the World Health Organization on January 22, 2026, a year after President Donald J. Trump issued the order to pull out. This was not a small bureaucratic tweak; it was a deliberate, America‑first decision to stop sending our tax dollars and our authority to a bloated United Nations agency that repeatedly failed the American people.
The administration’s case was straightforward: the WHO mishandled COVID‑19, demonstrated problematic political entanglements, and refused meaningful reforms, so we stopped playing by rules that cost us dearly. President Trump’s executive order laid out why the U.S. would no longer accept an arrangement that lets foreign influence shape American public‑health policy. Conservatives across the country who watched the chaos of 2020 applauded a White House finally willing to put American lives and American taxpayers first.
Let’s talk dollars and sense — the U.S. was carrying a huge share of WHO’s budget for decades, paying roughly $111 million in assessed dues plus about $570 million in voluntary contributions annually. That’s roughly seven hundred million dollars a year of hard‑earned American money flowing into an organization that, critics say, too often prioritized diplomacy over transparency. Ending that subsidy is basic fiscal patriotism: keep our money here so it benefits Americans first.
The WHO claims the U.S. still owes about $280 million in unpaid dues for 2024–2025, a point the administration disputes as it completes the legal withdrawal. Whatever the accounting back‑and‑forth, hardworking Americans should be furious that previous administrations handed so much leverage to a body that didn’t protect us. This debate over precedent and payment only underscores the larger truth — we cannot outsource our national security, including biosecurity, to an unaccountable global bureaucracy.
This White House also made the right call in pausing U.S. participation in the so‑called Pandemic Treaty negotiations, refusing to let global elites draft binding rules that could strip American self‑determination on public‑health measures. The administration’s order explicitly halted negotiations and directed agencies to find bilateral partners instead, a commonsense move to preserve sovereignty without surrendering our ability to cooperate where it benefits the nation. Real cooperation happens between sovereign equals, not under the thumb of a politicized UN agency.
Washington’s critics warn of lost data and cooperation on things like flu strain selection and global surveillance, and those concerns deserve a sober response — not hysteria. But the alternative is to build smarter, bilateral agreements and strengthen American institutions like the CDC, so we aren’t beholden to intermediaries who can be compromised or slow to act. If a nation is truly serious about protecting its people, it invests in its own capacity rather than outsourcing critical functions to international bureaucrats.
Patriots know that sovereignty isn’t about isolation; it’s about control. The HHS and State Department statements make clear the U.S. will continue global health work on its own terms, redeploying resources directly and insisting on transparency and reciprocity. That’s what America’s founders expected — deal with other nations from strength and principle, not from dependency on unelected global agencies pushing one‑size‑fits‑all prescriptions.
Hardworking Americans should feel relieved and vigilant: relieved that Washington finally put the national interest above international prestige, and vigilant to make sure public health is governed by science, local judgement, and the will of the people — not by distant bureaucrats or foreign powers. We must insist our leaders spend our money wisely, defend our constitutional prerogatives, and build direct partnerships that protect families, jobs, and freedoms. This is health independence, and it’s time conservatives hold the line so America never again signs away its safety or its sovereignty.
