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UNITED NATIONS — The Trump administration says it has secured more than $1 billion in cuts to United Nations budgets in just six months, calling the reductions evidence that an institution long considered resistant to change is finally beginning to reform.
The latest milestone came June 30, when all 193 U.N. member states approved a peacekeeping budget of approximately $5.1 billion for the coming fiscal year — about $550 million, or 9.7%, less than the previous year.
Combined with a 15% reduction to the U.N.’s regular budget approved in December, U.S. officials say the agreements amount to more than $1 billion in cuts to assessed U.N. budgets, a level they describe as unprecedented.
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U.S. Representative for U.N. Ambassador Jeff Bartos addresses a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on the situation in Libya, at the U.N. headquarters in New York City, U.S., November 25, 2025. (Eduardo Munoz/Reuters)
Assessed budgets are funded through mandatory contributions charged to member states under a formula based largely on the size of their economies.
“On June 30th, with U.S. leadership, all 193 countries came together again for the second time in six months,” U.S. Ambassador for U.N. Management and Reform Jeff Bartos told Digital. “We’ve achieved over a billion dollars of savings in six months, which is unprecedented. Any one cut would be unprecedented. The totality of the reforms is monumental.”
The agreement comes as the United Nations faces mounting financial pressure and prepares for a leadership transition in 2027, with Secretary-General António Guterres set to leave office at the end of his second term. At the same time, the Trump administration has made reform a central pillar of its U.N. strategy, arguing the organization has become overly bureaucratic and inefficient.
In response to questions from Digital, U.N. spokesman Stéphane Dujarric confirmed that the peacekeeping budget was reduced by roughly $550 million and the regular budget by 15%, describing both as “unprecedented reductions.”
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A Cameroonian United Nations peacekeeping soldier guards women fleeing the village of Zike as they arrive to the village of Bambara, Central African Republic, April 25, 2017. Picture taken April 25, 2017. REUTERS/Baz Ratner TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY – RTS143AS
Bartos argues the reforms reflect sustained pressure from the Trump administration and months of negotiations led by the U.S. Mission.
“The new budget, this reformed budget, the enhanced efficiency changes the culture of how the U.N. looks at peacekeeping,” Bartos said. “Every dollar has to achieve impact on the ground.”
He pointed to the U.N. Mission in South Sudan as an example, saying the United States worked to streamline the mission’s mandate before reducing its budget accordingly.
Another reform highlighted by the administration changes how the U.N. handles unused budget credits.
Until now, U.N. financial rules required the organization to return unspent funds to member states even if those contributions had never actually been paid, a practice critics said worsened the organization’s recurring liquidity crisis.
The General Assembly voted on June 30 to introduce, on a four-year trial basis, a new methodology under which unspent funds will be returned only when backed by cash actually received.
Bartos said the change could save the organization more than $1 billion over the next three years. That projected figure is separate from the more than $1 billion in budget reductions already approved over the past six months.
He called the change another example of “common-sense” reform and said it could save the organization more than $1 billion over the next three years.
The United Nations likewise welcomed the change, though officials noted it had been a longstanding priority of Secretary-General António Guterres.
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President Donald Trump (L) meets with United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres during the 80th session of the UN’s General Assembly (UNGA) at the United Nations headquarters on September 23, 2025 in New York City. World leaders convened for the 80th Session of UNGA, with this year’s theme for the annual global meeting being “Better together: 80 years and more for peace, development and human rights.” (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“I have been pushing for this reform for almost a decade,” Guterres said after the vote. He described the previous system as a “Kafkaesque cycle” in which the organization was expected “to give back cash that did not exist.”
Dujarric said the reform would allow the U.N. to manage resources “in a more predictable and responsible way” while helping ensure operational continuity, particularly for peacekeeping missions.
Bartos insists the latest budget agreements are only the beginning.
Among the administration’s next priorities are reforms to staff compensation, employee benefits and the U.N. pension system, areas he argues consume resources that could otherwise support humanitarian operations and peacekeeping missions.
“We’re going to continue to see us push whether it’s on benefits, whether it’s on staff compensation, whether it’s on the pension system,” Bartos said. “There’s massive numbers of additional reforms that our team is working on right now.”
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United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) vehicles drive along the main road leading to Lebanon’s southern town of Naqura close to the border with Israel on October 27, 2022. – Israel and Lebanon separately signed a US-brokered maritime border deal which paves the way for lucrative offshore gas extraction by the neighbours that remain technically at war. The exchange of letters is due to take place in the southern Lebanese town of Naqura, in the presence of US mediator Amos Hochstein and the United Nations’s special coordinator for Lebanon Joanna Wronecka. ( Photo by Mahmoud Zayyat/ AFP/Getty Images)
He also suggested reform will remain a central issue as member states begin selecting the next secretary-general.
“We’re going to select the next secretary-general,” Bartos said. “That reform momentum that has been growing over the last 15, 18 months … you’ll see that continuing in 2027 with the new secretary-general.”
