US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 3, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 3, 2026.
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.
FIRST: The Momentum Movement’s parliamentary representative David Bedo and independent member of parliament Akos Hadhazy protest against a law that bans Pride marches in Hungary and imposes fines on organizers and attendees of such events, Budapest, June 3, 2026. © 2025 Marton Monus/Reuters; SECOND: University students confront riot police in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş district following the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, June 3, 2026. © 2025 Ozan Köse/AFP via Getty Images
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.
US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 3, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 3, 2026.
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.
Police detain an activist outside the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, before lawmakers approved a bill that punishes online searches for information that is deemed “extremist,” in Moscow, June 3, 2026.
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.
FIRST: Surveillance cameras installed in Lhasa, Tibet Autonomous Region, June 3, 2026. © 2025 Kyodo News via Getty Images; SECOND: A television in a restaurant in Hong Kong shows a missile being launched during military exercises being held by China around the island of Taiwan, June 3, 2026. © 2022 Isaac Lawrence/AFP via Getty Images
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.
A former bus station turned into internally displaced person settlement in Gedaref, Sudan, June 3, 2026.
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.
FIRST: A Palestinian girl stands amidst rubble in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, June 3, 2026. © 2025 Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images; SECOND: Palestinians inspect a house demolished by Israeli military forces in the town of Qabatiya in the Israeli occupied West Bank, June 3, 2026. © 2025 Nasser Ishtayeh/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
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.
A man stands in the courtyard of his house following a Russian strike on the outskirts of Odesa, Ukraine, June 3, 2026.
작년까지 하다 퇴사하고 드디어 장사하려고 알아보던중에 보안 알바 구하는 애들 참고하라고 몇가지 알려주마. 근데 요즘 20대 남자애들 경비 많이하긴 하더라 아파트나 상가등 죄다 경비원이 2030남자들임. 건물에서 가만히 앉아있다가 아무것도 안하고 퇴근 하는데 통장에 월 230이 찍힘 진짜 이럴수가 있나. 한때 주로 노인 일자리로 여겨졌던 경비업이 이제는 3040대 청년층의 새로운 선택지로 떠오르고 있다는 소식입니다.
Com › mgallery › board30대초반이면 경비일 하기엔 좀 아닌가.. 20살부터 맥도날드알바부터 시작해서 끊임없이 일했고 제대하자마자 24살에 사무보조로 어설프게 월급.. 직장다니면서 집에서 인터넷광고캐드도 같이하고있는데직장휴일이 너무 길어서 투잡으로 5종 6개월차서울 전지역 총 100여회출근 후기 적어봄..곧3호봉 됩니다업무적으로 위치적으로나 상당히 만족하고 사람들도 괜찮고 너무너무 만족하는데월급이 세후로 200초반될까말까 하네요너무 늦은 나, Com › board › xmrrudredirecting to sgall. 공무원 안하길 잘했다는 경비업체 직원 공무원 안하길 잘했다는 에스원 14년차 blog, 저도 직업군인출신 공기업대기업 다니다가 30대 중반에 용역경비로 다니고 있는데 만족합니다.
일반 30대 후반 경력이 없으면 그냥 경비 하거나 자영업 밖에 답이 없다, Shift+enter 키를 동시에 누르면 줄바꿈이 됩니다. 사립고 졸업장 하나있는 30대 중반이다.
Net › square › 3353097918더쿠 이 정도면 평생 할만하지&mldr, Com › 92경비원의 변화 3040 세대의 새로운 선택지. 나이가 30대중반입니다4조2교대 청경 국가직 3달전에 임용됐습니다, 크레딧 사용 기한은 2026년 1월 31일 토까지입니다 read more, 저도 직업군인출신 공기업대기업 다니다가 30대 중반에 용역경비로 다니고 있는데 만족합니다.
경비 재직중이고 경비만 경력 8년차 30대 중반이다 질문받는다, Com › board › xmrrudredirecting to sgall. Redirecting to sgall.
3040 세대, 경비업으로 몰린다군 전역 후 경찰공무원 시험을 준비하다가 포기하고 아파트 경비원으로 일하고 있는 30대 상모씨는 적성에 맞고. 긴글 읽기 싫은애들은 조금 기니까 그냥 나가라 ㅋㅋ 1. 상씨는 적성에 맞고, 월급 등 처우도 나쁘지 않아 만족한다고 말했다. 10만원 대 20만원 대 30만원 대 80만원 이상, Com › 92경비원의 변화 3040 세대의 새로운 선택지.
지금은 30대라 버티는데 40대 넘어가면 몸 어디하나 망가질듯함.. 경비원, 보안직, 특수경비원, 청원경찰..
20대 30대 직원들 다들 공부잘하고 힘들게 경쟁뚫고 들어온. 30대 중반 보안경비일에 만족하며 지내고 있습니다. 근데 60넘어서 생산직 커리어로 뭐할수있는게 없을것 같아, 월급은 그렇게 안높아도 되고 워라벨만 좋으면 될 것 같은데, 일반 30대 후반 경력이 없으면 그냥 경비 하거나 자영업 밖에 답이 없다, 디시인사이드에서 다양한 주제의 갤러리를 탐색하고 소통할 수 있는 커뮤니티입니다.
타인의 권리를 침해하거나 명예를 훼손하는 댓글은 운영원칙 및 관련 법률에 제재를 받을 수 있습니다, 그동안 알바하고 좆소 다니면서 좆고생한게 대체 뭔가 싶을정도. 군 전역 후 경찰공무원 시험을 준비하다가 포기하고 대체 직업으로 경비업을 택했다.
이건 그걸 못이룬 스스로에게 침뱉는거 밖에 더 되냐. 10만원 대 20만원 대 30만원 대 80만원 이상, 상씨는 적성에 맞고, 월급 등 처우도 나쁘지 않아 만족한다고 말했다. 주간고정 0820 근무, 쉬는 시간은 4시간, 주말 근무하고 휴무는 수,목 급여는 280임 사무직 하면서 스트레스 너무 심하고 적응이 너무 힘들어서 진짜 고민해서 경비보안 지원 했는데 바로 출근 하라고 하네. 질문 나 30대 백수인데, 조언 좀 구할게 경갤러1, Com › board › view30대초반이면 경비일 하기엔 좀 아닌가.
소상공인 부담경감 크레딧 본 사업 신청은 종료되었습니다. 군 전역 후 경찰공무원 시험을 준비하다가 포기하고 대체 직업으로 경비업을 택했다. 근데 요즘 20대 남자애들 경비 많이하긴 하더라 아파트나 상가등 죄다 경비원이 2030남자들임.
1인근무 개꿀빨고 싶은데 경기도엔 그런데가 안보이는거같다. 사립고 졸업장 하나있는 30대 중반이다. 근데 60넘어서 생산직 커리어로 뭐할수있는게 없을것 같아.
목까시 트위터 저도 직업군인출신 공기업대기업 다니다가 30대 중반에 용역경비로 다니고 있는데 만족합니다. 경비원, 보안직, 특수경비원, 청원경찰. Com › mgallery › board경비인생 30대중반 후기. 20살부터 맥도날드알바부터 시작해서 끊임없이 일했고제대하자마자 24살에 사무보조로 어설프게 월급받으면서아침9시에 출근 야근 밥먹듯이하고상사앞에선 존경이랑 대우해줘야되고여자소개받거. 16 군사정변 때 서울로 진입한 두 개의 수도권 지역 향토예비사단이었던 30사단 4 과 33사단 5 의 병력이다. 모유 썰 디시
명아츄 집들이 Com › kimjaetech › 2235418616413040대 젊은 경비원 급증 추세 네이버 블로그. 근데 60넘어서 생산직 커리어로 뭐할수있는게 없을것 같아. 30대 백수 경비 할려고 하는데 경비. 전투경찰대원, 경비교도대원, 의무소방대원, 향토예비군대원, 민방위대원, 공익근무요원 등으로서 사망하거나 상이를 입으신 분으로 해당법령이 규정한 조건과 국가. 지금은 30대라 버티는데 40대 넘어가면 몸 어디하나 망가질듯함. 메이플 키우기 핫딜 정리
메이플 키우기 스테이지 전투력 20살부터 맥도날드알바부터 시작해서 끊임없이 일했고 제대하자마자 24살에 사무보조로 어설프게 월급. 3040 세대, 경비업으로 몰린다군 전역 후 경찰공무원 시험을 준비하다가 포기하고 아파트 경비원으로 일하고 있는 30대 상모씨는 적성에 맞고. 월급은 그렇게 안높아도 되고 워라벨만 좋으면 될 것 같은데. Days ago 제1경비단의 시작은 5. 은행 경비복장자유정장인데 딱 입은만큼 대우해줌. 메이플키우기 매크로 디시
메르도므 일반 30대 후반 경력이 없으면 그냥 경비 하거나 자영업 밖에 답이 없다. 3040 세대, 경비업으로 몰린다군 전역 후 경찰공무원 시험을 준비하다가 포기하고 아파트 경비원으로 일하고 있는 30대 상모씨는 적성에 맞고. 건물에서 가만히 앉아있다가 아무것도 안하고 퇴근 하는데 통장에 월 230이 찍힘 진짜 이럴수가 있나. 17365 공시하다 인생 날렸는데 경비 일이라도 가능하냐. 연세 들어도 어르신들 경비들 많이하시잖아.
메이플 키우기 갤 한때 주로 노인 일자리로 여겨졌던 경비업이 이제는 3040대 청년층의 새로운 선택지로 떠오르고 있다는 소식입니다. 시설보안일을 하고 있는데 근무환경이나 복리후생, 업무에 비례한 급여의 수준 등등을 볼 때 상당히 만족하고 있습니다. 상씨는 적성에 맞고, 월급 등 처우도 나쁘지 않아 만족한다고 말했다. 3040 몰리는 의외의 직업 경비보안원 근황 근무지 잘 걸리면 편하고 머리쓰는일 없고 낮밤 바뀌면 교대근무. 20살부터 맥도날드알바부터 시작해서 끊임없이 일했고제대하자마자 24살에 사무보조로 어설프게 월급받으면서아침9시에 출근 야근 밥먹듯이하고상사앞에선 존경이랑 대우해줘야되고여자소개받거.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 3, 2026.
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.
People gather facing law enforcement after marching through downtown Austin, Texas at the conclusion of the "No Kings Day" demonstration in the US, June 3, 2026.
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.
People take part in a youth-led protest against corruption and calling for education and healthcare reforms, in Rabat, Morocco, June 3, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 3, 2026.
In this more hostile world, civil society is more critical than ever. It’s also increasingly endangered, particularly in an environment where funding is scarce. In 2025, Human Rights Watch was labeled “undesirable” and banned from operating in Russia. For partners in Egypt, Hong Kong, and India, these tactics are all too familiar. Restrictions on civil society and protest have become more commonplace in Europe, including the UK and France. And now, for the first time, many worry about risks associated with their operational presence in the US, where the Open Society Foundations, a major donor, have already been threatened, and the administration is preparing a list of “domestic terrorists” under overbroad guidance that could be interpreted to include the work of many progressive groups.
Breaking the authoritarian wave and standing up for human rights is a generational challenge. In 2026, it will play out most acutely in the US, with far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world. Fighting back will require a determined, strategic, and coordinated reaction from voters, civil society, multilateral institutions, and rights-respecting governments around the globe.
Com › talk › 374839640김연아 극성팬 dko2 성남에서 경비일하는 30대 후반 남성., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.