President Donald Trump indicated he was open to rejoining the World Health Organization (WHO) just days after signing a Day One executive order withdrawing the United States from the international organization.
During a rally at the Circa Resort & Casino in Downtown Las Vegas, the president stated that it was wrong that a country with a considerably larger population than the United States was only paying a fraction of what the United States paid to the World Health Organization each year.
“We paid $500 million every year, while China paid $39 million, despite having a significantly greater population. Think about that. China pays $39 million for 1.4 billion people, but we pay $500 million for – who knows what we have.
“They offered me at $39 million, they said ‘We’ll let you back in for $39 million,’ they’re going to reduce it from [$500 million] to [$39 million], and I turned them down, because it became so popular I didn’t know if it would be well received even at [$39 million], but maybe we would consider doing it again, I don’t know, they have to clean it up a bit.”
According to NPR’s study of national contributions to the WHO, the United States pays nearly 10% of the WHO’s budget, while China pays approximately 3%.
Trump removed the United States from the World Health Organization in an executive order published hours after being ushered into office last week. The president listed reasons such as WHO’s “mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic,” the “failure to adopt urgently needed reforms,” and the “unfairly onerous payments” imposed on the United States. During Trump’s first term, in July 2020, he initiated measures to withdraw the United States from the WHO, but his successor, former President Joe Biden, later reaffirmed the country’s membership in the global health endeavor.
The president’s criticisms about the United States paying too much to the World Health Organization (WHO) are consistent with his objections about the United States’ participation in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. During the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week, Trump stated that he wants all NATO countries to contribute 5% of their GDP to NATO defense spending.
NATO established a 2% payment threshold in 2014, but, according to Trump, “most nations didn’t pay” until he began pressuring other countries to contribute more. However, according to NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, countries including as Spain, Italy, and Canada have failed to fulfill the 2% requirement.
Following Trump’s demands that NATO members invest 5% of their GDP on NATO, he questioned whether the US should spend any money on NATO at all, telling reporters from the Oval Office that the US was protecting NATO members, but those same members were “not protecting us.”
