The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside regular business hours.

The move is a blow to the Paris-based agency, founded after World War II to promote peace through international cooperation in education, science, and culture.

Trump took similar steps during his first term, quitting the World Health Organization, the UN Human Rights Council, a global climate change accord and the Iran nuclear deal.

Joe Biden reversed those decisions after taking office in 2021, returning the US to Unesco, WHO and the climate agreement.

With Trump now back in the White House, the US is once again pulling out of these global bodies.

The administration has also ordered a 90-day pause on all US foreign assistance to assess alignment with Trump’s foreign policy priorities.

Unesco is best known for designating world heritage sites, including the Grand Canyon in the US and the ancient city of Palmyra in Syria.

The US initially joined Unesco at its founding in 1945 but withdrew for the first time in 1984 in protest against alleged financial mismanagement and perceived anti-US bias, returning almost 20 years later in 2003 under President George W Bush, who then said the agency had undertaken needed reforms.

Unesco’s full name is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

Unesco officials said the agency was already a lot less dependent on the US than in the past, but the move would nonetheless impact the agency, with some limited impact on programmes the US was financing.

The US provides about 8% of Unesco’s total budget, down from about 20% at the time Trump first pulled the US out of the agency.