Trump Claws Back $4 Billion That Was Headed to Ludicrous UN Climate Fund
Trump’s focus on America First is leading to a review of our participation in the United Nations programs like UNESCO and what we are paying for them…and getting in return.
One of the best aspects of President Donald Trump is how much he embraces his America First policy, especially when it comes to spending taxpayer dollars.
Over my many years at Legal Insurrection, I have reported on the United Nations climate conferences that were filled with eco-activists, climate cultists, and globalist glitterati. While entertaining, it was hard to stomach how much our country was spending supporting pseudoscience and socialist agendas cloaked in environmentalism.
Well, those days are done and Trump has now clawed back our $4 billion from the grasping bureaucrats at the climate nations…much to the chagrin of the USAID-funded Politico.
The Trump administration has canceled $4 billion in U.S. pledges to the world’s largest climate fund — gutting a U.N. initiative helping over 100 countries adapt to the rapidly changing world.
“The government of the United States rescinds any outstanding pledges to the Green Climate Fund,” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres in a note dated Jan. 27, parts of which were seen by POLITICO.
The climate fund confirmed the decision.
“We have been made aware that the United States of America has notified the United Nations of its decision to rescind outstanding pledges to the Green Climate Fund,” it said in a statement to POLITICO.
The Trump administration has canceled $4 billion in U.S. contribution to the UN’s Green Climate Fund (GCF) which gives taxpayer dollars to foreign nations to help them address “a rapidly changing world.”
This saves each taxpayer $25. That isn’t a lot by itself, but the savings… pic.twitter.com/g2snu1UH6F
— Chris Martz (@ChrisMartzWX) February 8, 2025
That isn’t the only item for review relayed to the United Nations that Trump has on his agenda either. In addition to withdrawing the United States from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and ending funding to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). Trump also ordered a 90-day pause on US participation in UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization).
The review will assess whether and how UNESCO’s activities serve U.S. interests and will include an analysis of any potential anti-Semitism or anti-Israel sentiment within the organization. The White House cited concerns about “anti-American bias” as a reason for expediting the review.
Our nation withdrew from that group in 2018. I suspect there will be much to find, and our country will decline to participate, especially since Biden’s attempt to rejoin in 2023 came with a $600 million for back dues.
As a reminder, here are some of the past low-lights from the organization we have covered:
- UNESCO’s Exec Board ratifies resolution purging Jewish connection to Temple Mount
- UNESCO attempts to erase Jewish connection to Temple Mount
- Palestinians Launch New Bid to Usurp Jewish Holy Sites via UNESCO
- UNESCO aids and abets Palestinian attempt to steal Jewish historical identity
- UNESCO to Jewish History: Drop Dead
By staying out, the U.S. gets to keep its money, its honor, and its respect for real culture and science.
Meanwhile, I am enjoying the DOGE savings clock tick upward.
@DOGE
The D.O.G.E Clock is accumulating savings rapidly! @elonmusk please make this Clock available live here on @X ! pic.twitter.com/u1attxLSka— Judge Gibson (@JudgeGibson3) February 2, 2025
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Comments
I’m truly enjoying the “microscope and blowtorch” process employed by DOGE.
The UN is a corrupt entity that specializes in globalism, elitism, “climate” boondoggles, and spending American taxpayers’ money on anti-American projects.
Keep going, there’s more to be clawed back.
I still think that the UN has nothing to offer and that we should pull their plug, and kick them out of America. They are functionally the same as deep state.
Correct. They should be relocated to Azerbaijan.
My thought was that in the spirit of “equity,” they should be relocated to whichever country has a name that always appears last in any alphabetical listing, to compensate for their low privilege and esteem.
Off the top of my head, I suspect that would be Zimbabwe, but corrections are welcomed.
Of course, a lefty country with sufficiently perverse incentives could game the system by renaming itself to steal the “prize.”. For example, whiskey legend Ireland could rename itself Zymurgy… or treasure-hunting pirate haven Somalia could become Zzyzx.
Put it in Gaza.
They can just move into the UNRWA offices already there.
In the alternative, allow me to suggest Antarctica instead.
Getting rid of the UN sounds nice. But remember the old saying, keep your friends close but keep your enemies closer.
Put it next to the Newark airport for ease of access. Saying it will reduce congestion and save money in Manhatten as a justification too.
I don’t mind keeping the UN in NYC. Keep your enemies closer and all that, plus forcing all the diplomats to come to the US reinforces that the US is the most powerful country. If the US kicks the UN out then China will build a new palace for the UN overnight and offer them everything they could ever want at a substantial discount.
We keep the seat on the Security Council. We won WW2. We get to run the council of WW2 winners.
While we are at it can we stop sending foreign aid to countries that hate us.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/us-foreign-aid-by-country
Swiss banks hit hardest
May I suggest a different impact calculation. How many taxpayers are required to fund the expense. The average taxpayer pays $20K in Federal Income Taxes. Take $4B and divide by $20K shows that it takes 200,000 taxpayers working a full year to pay for this. This calculation should be done for every one of these ridiculous expenses.
I’m a great fan of expressing statistics in terms intuitively understandable by everyone. Your suggestion is genius. (Original?)
Unfortunately, yes, original. At least I haven’t heard of anyone expressing it this way. That $6M for tourism in Egypt? That takes 300 American taxpayers working all year to pay for that. The $2M for sex changes in Guatemala? 100 taxpayers working all year. The transgender opera in Columbia? Two Americans have to work all year for that.
I am a firm believer in the old standard
cost-benefit” analisis.
So now we’ve established the cost for each of these items, we must turn to the benefit of each,
$6Mn tourism in Egypt? Zero
$2Mn for sex change in Guatemala? Since sex cannot be changed anyway, double Zero
Tranny opera in Colombia? Don’t make me laugh that hard this early in the day.
Nah.
Better plan: find the insane government scammers who committed us to those things and sentence THEM to the rock pile for the year. Maybe some hard physical labour to put food into his mouth would result in a significant increase in his IQ factor.
I notice a mention of Politico here. How much was Politico paid to report on the UN Climate fund?
While on the Politico issue, I saw one of their hit pieces bad mouthing Trump and whining about USAID, not one peep about how they were in on the graft.
This one, I suspect… unless they’re thrashing about, having multiple seizires today.
“What Happened the Last Time a President Purged the Bureaucracy”
Yeah. What he leaves out is that McCarthy was right; the government in general, and particularly State, was infested by communists, even if most of them weren’t actual spies.
A giveaway is when he speculates that had “wise” employees at State not been purged or deterred from speaking, they might have warned against the USA’s “short-sighted anti-communism” in East Asia, including intervention in Vietnam. That’s exactly like referring to “short-sighted anti-nazism” in Europe in the 1930s.
Intervention in Vietnam was the right thing to do; the USA’s big mistake there was when JFK decided to oust Diem. One he did that we had a moral responsibility to defend South Vietnam; we broke it so we bought it. And we failed in that moral responsibility, due to a faithless Democrat-controlled congress refusing to fund the support that we solemnly promised the South Vietnamese when we withdrew, should they be attacked. Had JFK not had Diem killed, our role could have remained one of offering advice and technical support without putting troops at risk of combat, just like the Patriot crews we send to Israel.
I read that Politico couldn’t make payroll. I have not been able to confirm it.
Only twenty five bucks? Give it the hell back — that buys me a prime rib-eye.
“A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.” – Everett Dirksen
Every time leftists piss n moan about ‘It’s only a pittance of the fed budget Musk is clawing back, so why bother??’ I am reminded of that Dirksen quote.
I always just respond, “I’ll take it if you don’t want it.”
I’ll take it whether you want it or not.
Ah yes human rights council. The dumbasses on NextDoor are all up in arms because they think that somehow all of their current human rights will be revoked.
Well, if they believe that their rights include somebody else feeding, clothing, housing and paying for them, that human rights include unlimited abortion, and the right to squat on someone else’s property, the right to riot and burn anytime they please, why yes, those “rights” will be revoked.
If you’ve never read the US Declaration of Human Rights, you will be shocked at how many of those “rights” are “positive rights” — mandates upon other citizens to spend their money providing you with expensive benefits, such as a right to housing and a right to a job. The self-sufficient are enslaved to support the shiftless.
Of course, when the expensive “mandates” fl upon governments, they find wys to honor them without really honoring them. Like the Canadian healthcare system, which will definitely provide you a critical transplant organ… sometime after 2038,
(Did you know that the number of “assisted suicide” deaths in Canada — 15,300 in 2023 and rising — is rapidly closing in on surpassing the number of criminal gun homicides in the USA — 16,500 in 2024 and relatively constant since COVID? When it comes to killing fellow citizens, government democide beats free market murder every time.)
Reminds me of hat old time country song..Movin’ Day. “If ya can’t pay yer rent ya kin live out in a tent, its Movin’Day.
Damn. I meant the *UN* Declaration of Human Rights.
¡ꓠꓳꓕꓕꓵꓭ ꓕꓲꓷꓱ
Even if they believe that, and even if we were to suppose for the sake of argument that they currently enjoy such “rights” in the USA and soon they will not be, they’re still wrong to attribute such a revocation to our withdrawal from the UNHCR.
Any pseudo-rights (or actual rights) we enjoy in the USA are completely unrelated to our membership in UNHCR. That membership has never had any practical effect on the life of anyone in the USA who is not somehow employed in the industry the UNHCR generates. Joining UNHRC did not add any “rights” (real or imagined) to those they enjoy, and leaving it won’t take any away. Any that are taken away in the next few years would have been so even if we had remained there.
Leslie, your line in the article that says “…since Biden’s attempt to rejoin in 2023 came with a $600 bill for back dues.” has a tiny error.
According to the link, that “$600” figure should be “$600 million”.
Oh I saw the $600 and read the Mn as part of it. $600 won’t even buy supper for four of these rotters. They are ll “beter than that”.
Gambling time:
When will DOGE hit its first trillion.
With DOGE I’m like a 5 year old in September looking at the Sears catalog of what’s for Christmas. Instead of what I want under the tree, I’m circling stupid things I should not have to pay for.