Why U.S. Junior Professionals in the UN Still Matter

Over the last several years, there has been bipartisan support for increasing the number of Americans working in the UN, in part via the Junior Professional Officer (JPO) program. In the last Department of State, foreign operations, and related appropriations bill passed in 2024, Congress explicitly earmarked money for placing U.S. citizens in the JPO program and for the Department of State to enhance the competitiveness of U.S. citizens for leadership positions in the United Nations. The proposal by the current administration to zero out funding for the UN will negatively impact this route for U.S. influence. Instead, the United States should invest in this program with funding from across the U.S. government to have an exponential effect in boosting U.S. numbers and dramatically increasing U.S. influence and employment in key bodies.

Global competitors are increasingly vying for multilateral influence—including by ensuring their nationals make up both senior and junior positions at the UN. The most direct way to do that—outside of elections or appointments—is by paying for JPO entry-level positions. These roles are funded directly by donors, essentially allowing countries to pay for junior staff in areas they care about. Position costs vary depending on location and individual family circumstances, but range between $200,000 and $400,000 per year. JPOs act as independent international civil servants who often go on to long careers at UN agencies. Critically, JPOs are retained in the UN system, finding follow-on employment after the end of their one- to three-year term at an average rate of 55 percent or greater, depending on the organization, making it one of the most reliable paths to quickly improve national representation in the UN.

According to the UN, in August 2025, there were nearly 400 JPOs from nearly 30 donor countries assigned to 46 different UN departments. In 2010 and again in 2023, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that Americans were underrepresented in UN employment generally. Historically, U.S. JPO placements were low. These expert positions were mainly funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM), which placed staff into humanitarian agencies like the World Food Programme (WFP), UN High Commissioner for Refugees, or UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and Department of State’s Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation, which placed Americans at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to work on nuclear security.

But, over the last several years, the number of U.S. JPOs tripled thanks to new U.S. investment. In 2023, the United States had 147 JPOs across the UN system.

The first Trump administration created a team in the Department of State’s International Organization Affairs Bureau to support the employment of Americans in the UN and increase U.S. competitiveness, primarily with the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Continuing under the Biden administration, this team became a formal office and took a number of steps to boost the JPO program by funding more U.S. positions and strategically placing them in parts of the UN that had not previously hosted U.S. JPOs, such as the secretariat and key technical and standard setting bodies based in Geneva, where Beijing is heavily boosting its numbers. This new investment in the JPO program was bolstered by advertising the positions more broadly, establishing annual training for U.S. JPOs, and assigning staff to help them with follow-on placements at the UN. Financial support for these efforts began in 2019, and a Republican Congress boosted the funding for JPOs to a $5 million earmark in the FY 2024 International Organizations and Programs (IO&P) account.

Unfortunately, the Rescissions Act of 2025 zeroed out the remaining IO&P account, likely dramatically cutting U.S. placements. The FY 2026 Budget Request zeros it out altogether. Plus, this budget stripped the PRM of the majority of its program funding and made severe cuts to the humanitarian aid budget. This means few to no U.S. JPOs going forward.

Before this dramatic turn of events, there was bipartisan support in both the executive and legislative branches to boost and sustain this effort. Why?

Most overtly, there has been broad agreement on the need to counter rising PRC influence at the UN. There is direct great power competition across several spheres in the multilateral system, including personnel. Beijing clearly sees the opportunity in the JPO program and has dramatically ramped up its investment over the past decade accordingly. The number of Chinese nationals employed by the United Nations nearly doubled from 2009 to 2022, and in a study of just four UN entities, the UN Secretariat, Food and Agriculture Organization, World Health Organization, and International Labour Organization—China had the largest increase of JPOs: from 0 in 2015 to 49 in 2022, with likely dozens more today.

Across both the first Trump and Biden administrations, many in the executive branch and on the Hill made the case that strong U.S. candidates for UN leadership positions would advance U.S. interests. The JPO program acts as a feeder of talented staff into the UN bureaucracy and, thus, eventually, into UN leadership roles. This is especially salient with the high number of UN leaders reaching retirement age in the next decade. Even nearly two decades ago, in 2007, the UN identified that over 22 percent of its staff were over 55 and approaching retirement. This demographic challenge means that having qualified candidates in the right place at the right time can easily extend U.S. influence.

But does it really matter if an UN employee is an American? Yes. Internal staff help shape UN decisionmaking and norms, and having free-market, pro-democracy Americans involved can matter. This remains particularly true when the alternatives may be authoritarian or statist competitors more influenced or tied to their home governments. For instance, under PRC national Zhao Houlin’s leadership of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) from 2015 to 2022, historical documents were revised, substituting “Taiwan, Province of China” for the original “Taiwan.” As the Trump administration demonstrated recently with its endorsement of Doreen Bogdan-Martin for another leadership term at ITU, most administrations find Americans in leadership at the UN useful.

Even for those who do not believe the United States’ engagement at the UN advances U.S. interests, individual Americans’ contributions can be an easy way to retain some U.S. inroads to a UN that will soldier on even without the United States as an active participant.

Recommendations

Supporting Americans working at the UN via the JPO program is a relatively hands-off way to ensure that even as the United States draws down its direct engagements and financial investment in multilateral institutions, it keeps a hand in the future of areas that align with U.S. interests. In order to continue the bipartisan investment in promoting Americans in the UN, it will be critical to increase the funding for JPOs and other efforts and get more U.S. agencies participating in the effort.

• Congress should designate $35 million a year to support Americans in the UN. Looking at the FY 2026 budget, Congress should make clear that a strong multi-sector JPO program would benefit U.S. interests regardless of the government’s engagement—or disengagement—at the UN. Specifically, congressional appropriators should make clear in their mark-up that at least $35 million a year is needed to support Americans in the UN and to maintain the current number of U.S. JPOs. This funding can be earmarked within the newly requested $2.9 billion America First Opportunities fund, where the president has discretion to provide contributions to international organizations that align with White House priorities.
• The Department of State should have funding for staff placement at the humanitarian and global health–related agencies that align with the new “International Humanitarian Assistance” account. A pipeline in the humanitarian sector is crucial if the United States is to maintain its leadership of WFP and UNICEF, and if —despite severe budget reductions—the United States will most likely remain the largest bilateral donor. Past anecdotes would suggest that driving reform and shaping priorities is smoother when UN partners are compatriots.
• Technical and security U.S. government agencies should designate their own funding for JPOs. The United States will fall behind the PRC’s investment in JPOs if it simply maintains the current level of funding. Funding should also be earmarked for JPOs from other departments and agencies, including the technical and security agencies that the Trump administration has exempted from budget cuts. For example, the FAA could fund staff at the International Civil Aviation Organization, Commerce at the International Maritime Organization, the ITU, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the Department of Energy at the IAEA, and the Department of Defense at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
• All U.S. government departments and agencies should encourage JPOs to specialize in areas that align with current U.S. foreign policy. This includes: nuclear weapons, peace and security, humanitarian aid, and key standard-setting bodies such as ITU and WIPO. Senator Risch called attention to these fields in 2020 for China’s efforts to increase its own representation in influential roles.

Allison Lombardo is a senior associate (non-resident) with the Humanitarian Agenda and Human Rights Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. Ella Lipin servedas deputy assistant secretary with the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of International Organization Affairs.