Every day, billions of people around the world go to work, enjoying basic rights and protections to keep them safe and treated fairly. Yet these safeguards have not always existed; they were won in part through the work of the International Labour Organization (ILO). Since its founding in 1919, as part of the Treaty of Versailles that ended World War I, the ILO has helped establish the fundamental labor rights that now shape the global economy. It was an important driver of the eight-hour workday, helped promote equal access to job opportunities, led efforts to fight child and forced labor, and worked with labor and business organizations to support health and safety standards for working people the world over.
As the economy evolves, the ILO continues to play an important role. Today, it helps to establish standards for domestic workers and labor in the digital economy while also fighting to end gender-based violence and harassment in the workplace.
Despite these benefits, the Trump administration has consistently sought to hobble the ILO as part of its broader attack on traditional forms of multilateral cooperation. Such actions are, at best, shortsighted; and at worst, they demonstrate a persistent anti-worker foreign policy that will undermine the interests of the United States for years to come. Importantly, these Trump administration actions don’t just harm foreign workers but Americans too.
What is the ILO, and why does it matter?
The International Labour Organization was established as part of the now-defunct League of Nations to promote the general welfare of working people through the establishment of common international labor standards. As World War II was ending, the organization staked out the important principle that “labour is not a commodity,” expressing in its famous 1944 Declaration of Philadelphia that working people must not be treated like commodities or capital and that they deserve dignity and respect—as well as freedom of expression and association. Indeed, the ILO’s constitution makes clear that the failure of any nation to adopt humane working conditions is an obstacle to others seeking to improve conditions within their own borders.
The ILO became formally part of the new United Nations in 1946. David Morse, an American expert on labor policy and a Labor Department appointee of President Harry Truman, served as the agency’s director-general from 1948 to 1970. His term culminated with the ILO winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1969, in part for its work to eliminate global poverty through dignified work and employment.
Unlike other multilateral agencies, the ILO’s membership is made up of not only governments but also worker and employer organizations. As a result, every decision made by the ILO—from budgetary allotments to priority workstreams to new standards—is developed by national governments along with the workers and employers who are affected by these decisions.
In 1998, the ILO adopted the Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, which contained four fundamental policies: 1) the right of workers to associate freely and bargain collectively; 2) the end of forced and compulsory labor; 3) the end of child labor; and 4) the end of unfair discrimination against workers. Later, an amendment added a fifth principle: a safe and healthy working environment. Nearly every subsequent trade agreement negotiated by the United States has used these principles as a baseline for labor rights. This is because foreign governments are often reluctant to use U.S. labor laws as a basis for bilateral standards but are typically willing to accept the conventions of an international body whose principles are developed through a clear tripartite structure, involving government, workers’ organizations, and business associations.
Furthermore, the ILO plays an important role in ensuring these standards are implemented through reporting, technical assistance, investigation, and arbitration mechanisms. While the ILO standards represent international consensus, adherence is an ever-evolving and continuous effort.
The Trump administration’s attacks on the ILO
One of the first actions of the second Trump administration was to remove the United States from several U.N. organizations and cut funding for many others. In August 2025, the White House announced a planned $107 million cut to the ILO, as part of a broader package intended to cut billions in funding for various international organizations. In January 2026, the administration removed references to the ILO from its finalized list of agencies to withdraw from and/or defund; but then, the White House applauded House Republicans for zeroing out the ILO in their national security budget. This has left the ILO’s funding and U.S. participation, more broadly, in a state of operational and financial limbo.
Indeed, while the White House did not announce a funding cut to the ILO, it also has not paid the dues the United States owes—which currently amount to about $300 million. As a result, the ILO has proposed to eliminate 120 jobs earlier this month in an effort to manage a “severe liquidity crisis” brought on by the Trump administration’s actions. This adds to the more than 200 jobs slashed since 2025. The ILO will also need to restructure its internal teams and will very likely pull back on the services it provides to working people around the world. Moreover, this failure of the United States to pay its owed contributions means that the U.S. delegation to the ILO will lose its voting rights next year, reducing its influence in critical global debates.
$300M
Unpaid bills owed to the ILO by the United States
The cuts have not gone unnoticed by the U.S. business community or American workers. In a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the American Apparel & Footwear Association and nine other trade associations representing different parts of the U.S. business community demanded the immediate restoration and continuation of U.S. funding for the ILO, as well as participation in the ILO going forward. These business groups warned that declining participation undermines global labor standards and American influence abroad. Such calls have been echoed by the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of labor unions in the United States, which recently urged continued U.S. engagement in the ILO as part of its recent resolution on good jobs today and tomorrow.
The lasting impact of a weakened ILO
If the United States were to withdraw from the ILO, not only would the United States lose influence over the development of labor standards globally, but the void left by its departure would almost certainly be filled by others—often with lower standards in mind. This would be good for neither the U.S. business community nor American workers—nor, for that matter, workers anywhere else. If future trade deals continue to utilize ILO principles, the development of lower standards would set a bar that makes it harder for American workers to compete fairly. In fact, as the Trump administration continues to push for further deregulation, the ILO’s work grows even more critical, helping to create and enforce standards to ensure the global economy works for everyone involved.
For example, the ILO requires member countries to seek the effective abolition of child labor, working with countries to develop minimum standards to this end. Foreign manufacturers in places such as Vietnam and sub-Saharan Africa are thus strongly discouraged from cutting costs by employing vulnerable children in their factories—which helps law-abiding U.S. companies compete on more level terms. The ILO also draws attention to persistent labor inequities, pointing other organizations toward problematic practices in need of remediation.
If future trade deals continue to utilize ILO principles, the development of lower standards would set a bar that makes it harder for American workers to compete fairly.
In terms of forced labor, the Trump administration’s attacks on the ILO are even more confusing. The ILO is one of the most important organizations fighting the use of forced labor in supply chains—one of the rationales the Trump team has used to justify its tariffs. Without the ILO to define and monitor forced labor, or to help remediate instances of forced labor once identified, there undoubtedly would be more—not less—forced labor in global supply chains.
China, in particular, will be thrilled if the ILO is neutered by the Trump administration, as its use of forced labor is routinely called out by the organization, often embarrassing Beijing on the world stage. An ILO report earlier this year, for example, chastised China and called on it to “immediately cease any discriminatory practices, including racial harassment, against the Uyghur population and any other ethnic minority groups.” The ILO report cited evidence of “coercive labour-transfer programmes in both Xinjiang and Tibet” and “that persons who decline to participate in labour-transfer programmes generally risk being sent to detention camps.”
As the global economy grapples with advances in technology that are changing how goods are produced and traded, and by whom, the ILO is poised to play a pivotal role in ensuring that the benefits of new technology benefit working people and their families. Earlier this year, the ILO finalized its first convention regulating the so-called “platform economy.” This could reshape employee-contractor distinctions, making it much harder for tech companies to use independent contractors. Though it is highly unlikely that the United States will ratify the convention, other countries most certainly will. As such, U.S. businesses would need to abide by the standards set by the ILO when doing business abroad. According to press reports, the U.S. voice in the development of the convention has been far “weaker” than normal because of uncertainty over the Trump administration’s commitment to the ILO.
Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and the subsequent data-center buildout also suggest an important role for the ILO. The organization has already developed an index of occupational exposure to generative AI, providing resources to governments looking to ensure a place for working people in the digital economy of tomorrow. It has also suggested new health and safety standards to protect workers engaged with AI at work. Without common baseline standards, efforts to prevent massive job losses—as predicted by many AI industry insiders—will be even harder to implement.
Impact on the future of U.S. trade agreements
The impact of ILO cuts—and a lack of U.S. participation—will shape U.S. trade policy for years to come. Several of the ILO’s factory monitoring programs, including Better Work Haiti and All Hands in Kenya, are statutorily required by existing U.S. trade agreements. If the ILO were to pull back from these programs, as its smaller budget suggests it might, working conditions could deteriorate quickly. This is neither good for the workers at the factories in question nor the U.S. businesses—and their workers—that would need to compete against lower-standard, lower-cost products coming from places like Kenya and Haiti.
The same is true of the trade deals recently negotiated by the Trump administration with countries such as Malaysia, Vietnam, and Cambodia. Each includes provisions that require their governments to take steps to prevent forced labor and child labor. But without technical assistance from the ILO—or the U.S. government’s Department of Labor, which saw its international labor office also gutted by the Trump administration—these commitments will be difficult to fulfill or even monitor.
Part of a broader anti-worker agenda
The Trump administration’s hostility toward the ILO is just part of a broader attack on the rights, processes, and institutions that support working people—in the United States and around the world. Domestically, the Trump administration has eliminated collective bargaining rights for more than 1 million federal workers, “by far the largest single action of union-busting in American history.” It has weakened the federal agency responsible for ensuring private sector workers have the right to organize; it has scaled back antidiscrimination protections; and it has reduced enforcement and penalties for workplace safety violations.
Internationally, the Trump administration has slashed more than $700 million in technical assistance programs offered by the U.S. government to contest union-busting activities, the use of forced labor, or violence against workers more broadly. The administration cut funding for programs that combat forced labor in Mexico’s agriculture sector, labor abuses in garment factories in Southeast Asia, and human rights abuses in fisheries, mining, and auto supply chains around the world. In Honduras, for example, one of the administration’s cuts to the Labor Department killed a program that had resulted in more than 6,000 children enrolling in educational programs—which will likely result in thousands of kids being forced to work in unsafe, exploitative environments. This is a stark reminder that due to these cuts, vulnerable workers around the world are facing even greater risks.
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Conclusion
Disdain for organizations, such as the ILO, that fight to improve working conditions does not make America better off; it gives license to the worst actors in the global economy. Moreover, it undermines American values and competitiveness. No wonder U.S. labor organizations and the U.S. business community are both pushing back.