Donald Trump may have personally run exclusive clubs, but America, under his presidency, is dropping its membership in global clubs left and right. His administration recently severed our ties to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), as well as other organizations where countries collaborate on addressing borderless challenges and opportunities. In the last week, the Trump administration has been absent from the COP 30 Climate Summit in Brazil. It has no plans to attend the upcoming G-20 meetings in South Africa, which will bring together the world’s largest economies.
In this moment, as America retrenches from global leadership, cities and states need to step up and join as many multinational organizations as will have them. Whether staying in the Paris Agreement on climate or coordinating with global health organizations to head off the spread of bird flu, measles, and AIDS, subnational actors need to fill the vacuum Washington is creating. Moving fast and breaking things has consequences.
In response, while the Trump administration withdraws from multilateral accords, international organizations, and global institutions, the U.S. federal system allows for individual states to fill the gap. States need to step up their global engagement in the face of American retrenchment, treaty nullification, and alliance abandonment to enhance America’s global posture and foster economic growth.
This is not a new idea.
During the first Trump administration, no sooner had the White House decided to withdraw from the Paris Accords than California, New York, and Washington formed the United States Climate Alliance and pledged to uphold their environmental obligations. Whether they enhance and align with the federal government or pursue policies that seek to maintain traditional alliance relations and established commercial, climate, and cultural ties, American states have the legal means and political incentives to engage in global relations. California’s Governor Gavin Newsom is actively and assertively testing the case by seeking to expand strategic international trade relationships in light of the Trump tariffs. As Newsom puts it, “California is not Washington, D.C.”
During the first Trump administration, American diplomats countered foreign countries’ anti-Trump narratives by quietly highlighting the independence of states and the nation’s broader policy pluralism. In global capitals critical of Trump’s policies, American embassies could push back and demonstrate that some of the nation’s largest and most economically vibrant states have maintained good foreign relations and favorable environments—in tourism, for students studying abroad, through independent energy policies, and a variety of COVID-19 mitigation measures.
States also have strong brand equity. California is a highly respected global brand. Hollywood has seared the easy-going, free-spirited state’s sea, surf, and sun lifestyle into the worldwide imagination. And the state can bring its considerable wares to the global marketplace. For his part, Trump hasn’t hesitated to let the states loose on the world stage when it suits him. During the pandemic, his administration forced every state to fend for itself in a bidding battle to secure limited supplies of PPE and compete against each other for critical equipment on the global market.
Every state has something to offer and a place to land. States matter. Oil-rich Texas, for instance, could consider joining OPEC+ to bring an American voice to the table and assert a role in the globalized energy market and transition. New York, the nation’s financial center, could seek admission to the World Bank and the IMF.
In this light, the global economic powerhouse of California should be admitted into the G7, given that the state’s $4.1 trillion GDP and throw-weight are greater than those of five of the current members.
California’s participation would be good for the state, the G7, and America. It would allow America’s foremost economic entity to represent the nation’s interests and explain economic trends, from AI and biotechnology to fintech and quantum computing. All from a state that is on the bleeding edge of technological and cultural development. California would be able to help shape policy and bring back to Washington early warnings about G7 plans in the offing
There is some good news for California—a state that makes up around 20 percent of America’s GDP and would now be the world’s fourth-largest economy if it were a sovereign nation-state. The G7, made up of democracies that are economic powerhouses, already allows for “non-enumerated members”.
Thanks to whiplash policy reversals by the Trump administration, the long-standing G7 organization is confronting a massive challenge to its survival and relevance. The dominant American voice, a strong American dollar, and traditionally stabilizing American economic policies have served as an anchor for the G7 to coordinate nations in developing stabilizing global financial policies, addressing geopolitical tensions, and issuing critical joint communiques.
No more.
No sooner had the previous Oval Office occupant moved out than the new occupant floated the idea that fellow G7 members have tariffs imposed on them, questioned their sovereignty (hello, Canada), and reasserted that Russia should rejoin the group and return it to a G8.
Traditionally, these multilateral institutions have only admitted sovereign nations as members; however, there are exceptions in the multilateral universe where quasi-states are granted either observer or special status, making this concept neither new nor unique. Hong Kong and Macau, for example, are members of the WTO—despite not being sovereign entities. The United Nations and some of its specialized agencies allow non-state actors to participate as observers.
These exceptions are not only valid on the global stage, but also within our own country. Entities that are territories are given special status in the Congress, within national political parties, and on the world stage (think Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam, and Washington, D.C.). These players are often referred to as subnational actors.
Subnationals, whether sovereign or not, have a voice and enough independence to make a difference in the new, revised, and revisionist world order. Canada has been devolving its federal power to its native tribes, sovereign entities that reside within federal boundaries but are granted greater autonomy. State policies now need to reckon and reconcile with their unique status as assertive native councils pursue global energy policies and partners against Ottawa’s wishes.
America is set up for its states to operate independently, thanks to the founders’ concepts of states’ rights via federalism. In recent history, Supreme Court decisions and administration actions have reinforced the importance of state independence and autonomy. From controversial healthcare issues like abortion to climate policy, states have been increasingly given a free hand at deciding how they will govern, with whom they will associate, and where to allocate their resources.
Decades of globalization and the freer flow of capital, trade, people, and ideas have further devolved power from Washington, D.C., and given states more say, standing, and supremacy over their internal and international affairs as the Trump administration seeks to withdraw from international conventions, treaties, organizations, and overall engagement.
Donald Trump’s Washington, D.C., seems more concerned with quitting, renegotiating its relationship, or entirely undermining nearly every multilateral organization to which it is a party—and even some where it is not.
Groucho Marx once said he would never want to belong to a club that would accept him, but California should be a member of a club that has not yet invited her. If the state joins, it will make the G7 club more appealing and maybe even more relevant than ever.
