By SARA SCHONHARDT
The United States is officially out of the Paris Agreement, making it the only country to quit the historic climate pact — twice.
The move to leave the agreement, set in motion by President Donald Trump exactly one year ago, takes effect Tuesday. Trump announced the departure on Jan. 20, 2025, his first day in office, followed by a written statement one week later to the United Nations, which confirmed in writing that American participation in the agreement would end on Jan. 27, 2026.
“Thanks to President Trump, the U.S. has officially escaped from the Paris Climate Agreement which undermined American values and priorities, wasted hard-earned taxpayer dollars, and stifled economic growth,” White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said in an email. “This is another commonsense America First victory for the American people!”
Trump is also orchestrating a withdrawal from the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, the 1992 treaty that gave birth to the Paris Agreement and serves as the global foundation for addressing rising temperatures.
“What I’m feeling and seeing is the world moving on without us,” said Frances Colón, senior fellow for international climate policy at the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think tank.
Even before the Paris withdrawal became official, the Trump administration had essentially left the climate process. Secretary of State Marco Rubio shuttered the climate office at the State Department that oversaw international negotiations and fired its experts. EPA withheld data on U.S. climate emissions from the U.N. for the first time ever and is in the process of terminating its greenhouse gas reporting program. The agency is also preparing to repeal the endangerment finding, a 2009 scientific determination that gave EPA its authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
