Trump Not Reconsidering Decision to End Relationship With World Health Organization

President Donald Trump speaks during an event in the Rose Garden on “Safe Policing for Safe Communities”, at the White House in Washington, on June 16, 2020. Alex Wong/Getty Images

President Donald Trump said he’s not reconsidering his recent decision to terminate the United States’ relationship with the World Health Organization (WHO).

“I’m not reconsidering, unless they get their act together, and I’m not sure they can at this point,” Trump told reporters on June 15 at the White House.

He expressed hope that in the years ahead, the organization can right itself. The United Nations body has been “a disaster” in recent months, he said, including opposing his closing the United States off from China in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The WHO has close ties with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and repeatedly parroted its propaganda during briefings and reports, despite evidence obtained by The Epoch Times and others showing that the Chinese regime manipulated information to hide what was happening with the CCP virus.

While the WHO was praising Beijing in public in January, for instance, it was complaining internally about Chinese officials withholding crucial data about how the virus was spreading.

Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee on June 15 released a 50-page report (pdf) that found that the WHO “enabled the CCP cover-up by failing to investigate and publicize reports conflicting with the official CCP, while at the same time praising the CCP’s response.”

Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) (C) at a congressional hearing in Washington on April 25, 2018. Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times

That coverup “played a significant role in turning what could have been a local epidemic into a global pandemic,” Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) said in a statement.

“And, unfortunately, the World Health Organization under the leadership of Director-General Tedros only exacerbated the problem by repeatedly ignoring warnings about the severity of the virus, including from their own health experts, while at the same time parroting the CCP’s propaganda without independently confirming their claims.”

The WHO appears to have repeatedly violated its own rules and obligations to member states, the lawmakers concluded, and they alleged that its head delayed declaring a public health emergency for political, not medical reasons.

Tedros Ghebreyesus, the WHO’s chief, continues to use misleading statements in public and reports that enable CCP propaganda, misinformation, and revisionist history, the group found. The WHO has defended itself amid heightened scrutiny and denies treating China in a way that undermined the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

While findings suggest big problems, McCaul said he believes the United States shouldn’t sever ties with the WHO because the country can “affect more change within the organization as a member.”

Trump said he would look at the report and what McCaul said but called the WHO “very disappointing.” The United States paid the group hundreds of millions of dollars each year and was the top donor for many years, but the WHO has “been a puppet of China,” he said.