Will Human Rights Survive a Trumpian World?

Authoritarian Advances Threaten Rules-Based Order

The global human rights system is in peril. Under relentless pressure from US President Donald Trump, and persistently undermined by China and Russia, the rules-based international order is being crushed, threatening to take with it the architecture human rights defenders have come to rely on to advance norms and protect freedoms. To defy this trend, governments that still value human rights, alongside social movements, civil society, and international institutions, need to form a strategic alliance to push back.

To be fair, the downward spiral predated Trump’s reelection. The democratic wave that began over 50 years ago has given way to what scholars term a “democratic recession.” Democracy is now back to 1985 levels according to some metrics, with 72 percent of the world’s population now living under autocracy. Russia and China are less free today than 20 years ago. And so is the United States.

Of course, democracy is not a panacea for human rights violations; the US and other longtime democracies have their own histories of colonial crimes, racism, abusive justice systems, and wartime atrocities. More recently, authoritarian leaders have exploited public mistrust and anger to win elections and then dismantled the very institutions that brought them to power. Democratic institutions are crucial to represent the will of the people and keep power in check. It’s no surprise that whenever democracy is undermined, rights are too, as evident in recent years in India, Türkiye, the Philippines, El Salvador, and Hungary.

In this context, 2025 may be seen as a tipping point. In just 12 months, the Trump administration has carried out a broad assault on key pillars of US democracy and the global rules-based order, which the US, despite inconsistencies, was, with other states, instrumental in helping to establish.

In short order, Trump’s second-term administration has undermined trust in the sanctity of elections, reduced government accountability, gutted food assistance and healthcare subsidies, attacked judicial independence, defied court orders, rolled back women’s rights, obstructed access to abortion care, undermined remedies for racial harm, terminated programs mandating accessibility for people with disabilities, punished free speech, stripped protections from trans and intersex people, eroded privacy, and used government power to intimidate political opponents, the media, law firms, universities, civil society, and even comedians.

Claiming a risk of “civilizational erasure” in Europe and leaning on racist tropes to cast entire populations as unwelcome in the US, the Trump administration has embraced policies and rhetoric that align with white nationalist ideology. Immigrants and asylum seekers have been subjected to inhumane conditions and degrading treatment; 32 died in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in 2025, and as of mid-January 2026, an additional 4 have died. Masked immigration enforcement agents have targeted people of color, using excessive force, terrorizing communities, wrongfully arresting scores of citizens, and, most recently, unjustifiably killing two people in Minneapolis, whose deaths Human Rights Watch has documented.

The US president of course has the authority to tighten US borders and enforce stricter immigration policies. The administration is not, however, entitled to deny legal process to asylum seekers, mistreat undocumented migrants, or unlawfully discriminate. In a well-functioning democracy, no electoral mandate should supersede domestic legislation, constitutional protections, or international human rights law. Trump’s team has repeatedly bypassed these guardrails.

The violations have not stopped at the border. The Trump administration used a 1798 law to send hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to an infamous prison in El Salvador, where they were tortured and sexually abused. Its blatantly unlawful strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific extrajudicially killed more than 120 people whom Trump claims were drug traffickers.

After the US attacked Venezuela and apprehended its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, Trump claimed the US would “run” the country and control its vast oil reserves. Despite paying lip service to human rights concerns under Maduro at the United Nations, Trump has worked with the same repressive apparatus to further US interests. Many Western allies have chosen to stay silent about these lawless moves, perhaps fearing erratic tariffs and blowback to their alliances.

Trump’s foreign policy has upended the foundations of the rules-based order that seeks to advance democracy and human rights, even if imperfectly.

Trump has boasted that he doesn’t “need international law” as a constraint, only his “own morality.” His administration has politicized the US State Department’s annual human rights report, stepped away from the global prohibition on antipersonnel landmines, voiced support for rewriting international rules on asylum, and skipped the UN’s Universal Periodic Review of the US’ human rights record.

His administration withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council and the World Health Organization and plans to quit 66 international organizations and programs that it describes as part of an “outdated model of multilateralism,” including key forums for climate negotiations. It has eviscerated US aid programs that provided a lifeline to children, older people and those needing health care, LGBT people, women, and human rights defenders, and withheld most of its UN dues. 

Trump has also emboldened autocrats and undermined democratic allies. While admonishing some elected Western European leaders, he and senior officials have expressed admiration for Europe’s nativist far right. He has favored autocrats such as Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Türkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, while continuing decades of US support to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

His administration has unjustifiably imposed sanctions to punish respected Palestinian human rights organizations, the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) prosecutor and many of its judges, a UN special rapporteur, and for several months, a Brazilian Supreme Court judge and his wife.

The institutional response in the US to Trump’s power grabs has been shockingly muted. Much of Congress, controlled by his own party, has not challenged his supercharged expansion of executive power. The leaders of the US’ most powerful technology companies have made significant donations and sought to placate the president. Some big law firms and prestigious universities have made deals rather than assert their independence, and some media organizations seem afraid to attract the president’s ire.

Has the US switched sides on the human rights playing field? While US engagement with human rights institutions has always been selective, China and Russia have long pursued an illiberal agenda. They stand much to gain from a US government that now expresses open hostility to universal rights. China and Russia remain strategic rivals of the US, but all three countries are now led by leaders who share open disdain for norms and institutions that could constrain their power.

Together, they wield considerable economic, military, and diplomatic power. If they were to consistently act as allies of convenience to erode global rules, they could threaten the entire system. Already, a loose international network of countries such as North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Myanmar, Cuba, and Belarus work in concert with Russia and China. These leaders share very little ideologically but align in undermining human rights and promoting a regressive international agenda. In word and in practice, the US government is now helping them in this endeavor.

The US’ weakening of multilateral institutions also dealt a serious blow to global efforts to prevent or stop grave international crimes. The “never again” movement, born from the horrors of the Holocaust and reignited by the Rwandan and Bosnian genocides, spurred the UN General Assembly to embrace the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) in 2005. Meant to guide international intervention to prevent and stop atrocities in tandem with efforts to prosecute and punish serious crimes, R2P made a real difference in places like the Central African Republic and Kenya.

Today, R2P is rarely invoked and the ICC is under siege. In addition to Trump’s far-reaching sanctions, in December 2025 a Moscow court sentenced the ICC prosecutor and eight of its judges to prison terms in absentia. Moreover, despite being ICC fugitives, in 2025, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin was welcomed by Donald Trump in Alaska, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traveled to Hungary, an ICC member state at the time, at Orban’s invitation.

Twenty years ago, the US government and civil society were instrumental in galvanizing a response to mass atrocities in Darfur. Sudan is burning again, but this time under Trump, with relative impunity. Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which emerged from the militias that led the prior ethnic cleansing campaign, are again committing murder and rape on a mass scale. A growing body of evidence indicates that the UAE, a longtime US ally that recently made multi-billion-dollar deals with Trump, is providing the RSF with military support.

In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Israeli armed forces have committed acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, killing over 70,000 people since the October 2023 Hamas-led attacks on Israel and displacing the vast majority of Gaza’s population. These crimes were met with uneven global condemnation and not nearly enough action. Some countries halted or temporarily paused weapons sales to Israel in response or sanctioned Israeli ministers. Trump, however, continued a long-standing US policy of almost unconditional support to Israel, even as the International Court of Justice is weighing allegations of genocide and has issued binding orders under the Genocide Convention to protect Palestinians’ rights.

Trump announced in February an alarming US plan to transform Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” free of Palestinians, which would be tantamount to ethnic cleansing. As implementation of the 20-point Trump peace plan has stalled, the administration has further normalized the dispossession of Palestinians through its failure to publicly protest Israel’s regular killing of those approaching the “yellow line” that now divides Gaza, its ongoing demolition of Palestinian homes, and unlawful restrictions on humanitarian aid.

In Ukraine, Trump’s peace efforts have consistently downplayed Russia’s responsibility for serious violations. These include indiscriminate bombing, coercing Ukrainians in occupied areas to serve in the Russian military, systematic torture of Ukrainian prisoners of war, the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, and the use of quadcopter drones to hunt and kill civilians. Rather than applying meaningful pressure on Putin to end these crimes, Trump publicly berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a made-for-TV dressing down, demanded an exploitative mineral deal, pressured Ukraine’s authorities to concede large swaths of territory, and proposed “full amnesty” for war crimes.

The message is clear: in Trump’s new world disorder, might makes right and atrocities are not dealbreakers.

무료 포르노 사이트 4porn sex3 tubepleasure fapvid bestandfree xxxhell lingerie mania porn+ alphaerotic hairycult tube4k lovelyclips find best videos crocolist exxxopedia freeporno tv pornovita oldsweet young leafs tubechubby fapvidhd xbison iwank xxx chilimovies bravomilf mylovedtube lustseries everymature tubehardcore tubebigcock. 15살에는 멕시코 에서 스트립댄서로 일하기도 했다. 우리 사이트의 멕시코 포르노 포르노 여우 ko. Mysweetapple public read more.

Sdmu-963 자막

확인 해봐 멕시코인 xhamster 포르노 영상들.. Смотрите порновидео mexico бесплатно здесь, на pornhub.. 온라인 sofia 0736 남동생과 섹스하는 멕시코 아가씨 barbara mori 6..

Ringonoki Kemono

Discover the growing collection of high quality most relevant xxx movies and clips. Dreamers나 adult video가 제일 낫지, 9k views 오류 로딩 썸네일 2145 crazy black gang107 banger, 어린 소녀들과 섹스하는 멕시코 hood box office 168. 17살에 거식증 을 앓았으며 2년 동안 계속되었다.

Seo Ahn Ass

Sano Myfans

이쁜얼굴도 유명한배우도 아닌오로지 엉덩이 하나땜에 반했던 배우였습니다, 17살에 거식증 을 앓았으며 2년 동안 계속되었다. 최상의 멕시코인 포르노 영상들, 2 섹스 비디오 튜브 xhamster, Watch mexican milf tube sex video for free on xhamster, with the superior collection of milf xxxx xxx free milf & mexican xxx hd porn movie scenes. 무료 포르노 멕시코인 toro porno.

최상의 멕시코인 포르노 영상들, 2 야동.. 체중에 기복이 있는 편이라 호불호가 갈리지만 체중 관리를 잘 했을땐 상당히 밸런스가 좋다.. Com › search › 멕시코멕시코 야동 xhamster.. 큰 엉덩이를 가진 섹시한 멕시코 밀프와 후배위와 애널 섹스..

S2couple19 섹스

깊은 삽입마다 엉덩이를 때리고 신음소리가 터져, Com › categories › mexican멕시코인 포르노 영상들 xhamster. 멕시코시티ap뉴시스권성근 기자 멕시코 캄페체주 당국은 9일현지시간 캄페체주 칼키니의 한 초등학교에서 6학년생들이 포르노 동영상을 만든. Смотрите порновидео mexico бесплатно здесь, на pornhub. 玛丽索菲娅艾伦 포르노 영상을 감상하세요. Dreamers나 adult video가 제일 낫지.

rule34video.com 오늘 소개할 작품이자 배우는 멕시코 출신의 엉짱녀 sophia castello 그 유명한 대기업 bangbros 에서도 출연하신분 이배우 역시 저가 중학교시절때 끝없이 연딸을 치게 해주던 분입니다. Cogiendo con amigo mexico. 9k views 오류 로딩 썸네일 2145 crazy black gang107 banger, 어린 소녀들과 섹스하는 멕시코 hood box office 168. 17살에 거식증 을 앓았으며 2년 동안 계속되었다. Mexico порно видео pornhub. rj01034675

ruruka video Mexico порно видео pornhub. 멕시코 십대 4k 멕시코 밀프 4k mexican mature 4k mexican moms 4k. Com › search › 멕시코멕시코 야동 xhamster. 세계 최고의 포르노 사이트에서 무료 포르노 시청, toro porno. 와서 에로틱 포르노 섹션을 시청하십시오. sdde748

sato ai 비번 디시 멕시코 포르노 뜨거운 라티나가 거칠게 떡치는 영상. 멕시코 십대 4k 멕시코 밀프 4k mexican mature 4k mexican moms 4k. 오늘 소개할 작품이자 배우는 멕시코 출신의 엉짱녀 sophia castello 그 유명한 대기업 bangbros 에서도 출연하신분 이배우 역시 저가 중학교시절때 끝없이 연딸을 치게 해주던 분입니다. 《천사들의 합창》 스페인어 carrusel 카루셀→회전목마은 1989년 에 멕시코 의 텔레비사 televisa s. 우리 사이트의 멕시코 포르노 포르노 여우 ko. reiniciar iqos originals

sj101 mib Lupo porno, 세계 최고의 포르노 사이트. Mami adelineloe sex 포르노 영상을 감상하세요. Lupo porno, 세계 최고의 포르노 사이트. Com › pornstars › all멕시코의 여배우 무료 포르노 비디오 xhamster. Watch 멕시코 포르노 porn videos.

rui_miyamoto0106 Xxx › categories › 406멕시코 미녀들의 강렬한 섹스 클립 pornv. 멕시코 초등학생들, 교실서 포르노 동영상 만들어 충격. 서니 리오니 sunny leone, 1981년 5월 13일 는 멕시코 의 배우, 모델, 전직 포르노 배우 이다. 성인용 xxx 영화에서 엄선된 최고의 장면을 감상하세요. 무료 포르노 사이트 4porn sex3 tubepleasure fapvid bestandfree xxxhell lingerie mania porn+ alphaerotic hairycult tube4k lovelyclips find best videos crocolist exxxopedia freeporno tv pornovita oldsweet young leafs tubechubby fapvidhd xbison iwank xxx chilimovies bravomilf mylovedtube lustseries everymature tubehardcore tubebigcock.

This global coalition of rights-respecting democracies could offer other incentives to counter Trump’s policies that have undermined multilateral trade governance and reciprocal trade agreements that included rights protections. Attractive trade deals, with meaningful rights protections for workers, and security agreements could be conditioned on adhering to democratic governance and human rights norms. Democracy already comes with benefits. While autocracies have generally fostered conflict, economic stagnation, or kleptocracy, as evidenced in multiple academic studies, including the work of the Nobel Prize-winning economist Daron Acemoglu, democratic institutions reliably yield economic growth. 

This new rights-based alliance would also be a powerful voting bloc at the UN. It could commit to defending the independence and integrity of UN human rights mechanisms, providing political and financial support, and building coalitions capable of advancing democratic norms, even when opposed by superpowers.

Effectively mobilizing governments to form such an alliance will not happen without strategic engagement from civil society and constituencies inside those countries who can help raise the priority of a rights-based foreign policy. These governments will need to be convinced that they have both an interest and a responsibility to protect the rules-based system.

Projects of this nature are bubbling up. Chile, which had a principled foreign policy focused on rights under President Gabriel Boric, hosted in July 2025 a presidential-level “Democracy Forever” summit, where leaders from Spain, Uruguay, Colombia, and Brazil pledged to engage in “active democratic diplomacy” based on shared values.

The Hague Group, led by Malaysia, South Africa, and Colombia, formed in January 2025 in “defense of international law” and in solidarity with Palestinians. Over 70 countries from all regions signed a joint statement defending multilateralism at the UN. Earlier, in 2017, former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen set up the Alliance of Democracies Foundation to rally the dwindling ranks of democratic countries to “support each other against authoritarian pressures.”

Whatever its precise contours, an alliance of rights-respecting democracies would offer a hopeful counterpoint to the authoritarian trope of China’s and Russia’s leaders standing alongside North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, observing military hardware in a parade in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in September. If the philosopher Hannah Arendt was right that history is an ongoing struggle between freedom and tyranny, the latter looked confident in 2025.

Yet, even in the worst of times, the idea of freedom and human rights is enduring. People power remains an engine for change. In the US, “No Kings” marches have drawn millions, protesters in Chicago, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, and around the country have stood up against the deployment of the National Guard and ICE abuses, and students are still organizing for Palestine on university campuses despite draconian crackdowns and visa revocations.

Buoyed by popular resistance, South Korean parliamentarians impeached their president to prevent him from grabbing power through martial law. Grassroots aid efforts by Sudan’s emergency response rooms, Hong Kong’s fire relief, Sri Lanka’s cyclone relief community kitchens, and Ukrainian mutual aid and solidarity collectives represent the best of this trend.

In 2025, Gen Z protests against corruption, inadequate public services, and poor governance in Nepal, Indonesia, and Morocco brought to the forefront the need for governments to listen to their youth and tackle corruption and inequality. But as the difficulties of restoring rights in Bangladesh after years under an authoritarian government illustrates, gains won through public mobilization can easily be lost unless democratic participation and free expression remain unassailable.