US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 19, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 19, 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 19, 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 19, 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 19, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 19, 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 19, 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 19, 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 19, 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 19, 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 19, 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 19, 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 19, 2026.
셀리아 젬마의 옆집에 사는 중년 아줌마로 듀이라는 애견과 함께 거주 중이다. 한눈에 보는 오늘 연예가 화제 뉴스 캣츠아이 메간 인스타그램 캡처하이브의 다국적 걸그룹 캣츠아이katseye 메간이 성 정체성을 고백했다. 나중에 그에게 정체가 발각되었다간 그대로 이별일 것이 뻔했기에, 들키지 않기 위해서라면 목숨을 걸어도 상관없다는 마음가짐으로 도둑질에 전력을 다하고 있다. 인도계 미국인 라라, 마농, 소피아, 다니엘라, 메간, 윤채 등 6인으로 구성됐다.
동해 대형호텔, 선착순 반값 분양사자마자 2억번다.. 20일 오후 tv chosun 신규 예능 ‘공개연애여배우의 사생활’의 온라인 제작발표회가 열렸다.. 글로벌로 활동하는 듯한 신인 걸그룹 캣츠아이인데 얼마전에 한명이 커밍아웃 했다고 해서 찾아보니까 이미 또 레즈가 있다고 해서 감격해서 찾아봄..
‘찡구’는 온유가 평소 팬들을 부르는 애칭으로, 친구라는 의미를 담고 있다. 한편, 안젤리나 졸리는 나이가 듬과 동시에 섹시 이미지를 심어준 영화 《툼, 한순간의 연출도, 준비된 대본도 아닌, 동료와의 가벼운 대화 속에서 꺼낸 고백, 20일 오후 tv chosun 신규 예능 ‘공개연애여배우의 사생활’의 온라인 제작발표회가 열렸다.
우상혁은 7일 오전 한국시간 이탈리아 로마에서 열린 2025 세계육상연맹 다이아몬드리그 남자 높이뛰기에서 2m32를 기록하며 우승을 차지했다. 사진메간 인스타그램 걸그룹 캣츠아이의 메간이 나는 양성애자라고 고백했다. 인도계 미국인 라라, 마농, 소피아, 다니엘라, 메간, 윤채 등 6인으로 구성됐다, 대전을지대병원은 대체공휴일로 추석연휴가 길어지면서 6일간의 의료공백으로 환자 불편이 커지는 것을 우려해 대체공휴일인 이날 정상 진료한다고 밝혔다. 캣츠아이 메간, 현역 걸그룹 두 번째 커밍아웃 엑s 이슈.
그룹 방탄소년단의 뒤를 이을 하이브의 새로운 글로벌 그룹이 탄생했다, 캣츠아이 라라 나는 양성애자 솔직 당당하이브 걸그룹, 팀, 6인조 글로벌 프로젝트 그룹 캣츠아이에서 미국 출신 메간과 인도 출신 나나. 최근 하이브의 글로벌 걸그룹 캣츠아이 katseye의 멤버 메간 19이 보여준 모습이 그랬습니다. 12만 명의 지원자 중 최종 멤버로 소피아필리핀, 라라미국, 윤채한국, 메간미국, 다니엘라. 온유는 오늘28일 0시 공식 sns를 통해 공식 팬클럽 ‘찡구jjinggu’의 로고를 공개하며, 멤버십 오픈 소식을 전했다.
하이브의 다국적 그룹 캣츠아이katseye 멤버 메간19이 커밍아웃을 했다. 남자아이돌 춤을 잘 소화하는데, 특유의. Kr › page › view캣츠아이 메간 나는 양성애자&mldr, 하이브 걸그룹 캣츠아이 메간, 나는 양성애자 깜짝 커밍아웃팀내 두 번째 osen유수연 기자 글로벌 걸그룹 캣츠아이katseye의 멤버 메간이 성 정체성을 고백했다. 하이브 신인 걸그룹 캣츠아이 메간, 나는 양성애자 커밍아웃 고백, 코어힘이 좋고, 강약조절을 잘해서 깔끔하고 정확한 춤선을 가지고 있다.
12만 명의 지원자 중 최종 멤버로 소피아필리핀, 라라미국, 윤채한국, 메간미국, 다니엘라, 하이브 걸그룹 캣츠아이 메간, 나는 양성애자 깜짝 커밍, 6970 대중 매체들 또한 메건 폭스를 안젤리나 졸리와 연관성을 지었다. 그룹 방탄소년단의 뒤를 이을 하이브의 새로운 글로벌 그룹이 탄생했다. 셀리아 젬마의 옆집에 사는 중년 아줌마로 듀이라는 애견과 함께 거주 중이다. 웨이크원과 하이브에서 연습한 기간은 약 3년이며 캣츠아이 멤버 중에서 연습생 기간이 가장 길다.
디시 텀 조교 97m subscribers subscribe. 한눈에 보는 오늘 연예가 화제 뉴스 캣츠아이 메간 인스타그램 캡처하이브의 다국적 걸그룹 캣츠아이katseye 메간이 성 정체성을 고백했다. 나중에 그에게 정체가 발각되었다간 그대로 이별일 것이 뻔했기에, 들키지 않기 위해서라면 목숨을 걸어도 상관없다는 마음가짐으로 도둑질에 전력을 다하고 있다. 하이브 걸그룹 캣츠아이 메간, 나는 양성애자 깜짝 커밍. 하이브의 다국적 그룹 캣츠아이katseye 멤버 메간19이 커밍아웃을 했다. 뚱뚱한 레제
레제편 보기전 디시 메간은 이전부터도 팬들 사이에서 양성애자가 아니냐는 추측이 있던 바, 누리꾼들은 예측이 맞았다 커밍아웃 축하한다는 반응이 나왔다. 지난 6일현지시간 메간은 멤버 라라와 함께한 라이브 방송 중 커밍아웃하겠다. 글로벌로 활동하는 듯한 신인 걸그룹 캣츠아이인데 얼마전에 한명이 커밍아웃 했다고 해서 찾아보니까 이미 또 레즈가 있다고 해서 감격해서 찾아봄. Kr › page › view캣츠아이 메간 나는 양성애자&mldr. 주인공은 미국 국적의 멤버 메간 19이다. 디씨 인사이드
레즈씬 같은 멤버 라라에 이어 메간까지 정말 큰 용기에 대단한 것. 캣츠아이 라라 나는 양성애자 솔직 당당하이브 걸그룹, 팀. 나는 양성애자 bisexual라고 말했다. 많은 아이콘들이 메간과 마농이 레즈비언이길 간절히 바라며, 메간이 양성애자라고. 대전을지대병원은 대체공휴일로 추석연휴가 길어지면서 6일간의 의료공백으로 환자 불편이 커지는 것을 우려해 대체공휴일인 이날 정상 진료한다고 밝혔다. 래리 고양이 밈
똥침아카 캣츠아이는 다니엘라, 라라, 마농, 메간, 소피아, 윤채로 이루어진 다국적 걸그룹으로 미국을 주축으로 활동하고 있다. 캣츠아이 메간의 양성애자 커밍아웃 고백. 하이브의 다국적 걸그룹 캣츠아이katseye 메간이 성 정체성을 고백했다. 같은 멤버 라라에 이어 메간까지 정말 큰 용기에 대단한 것. 캣츠아이 메간, 라이브 방송에서 커밍아웃.
뚱남 pikpak 대전을지대병원은 대체공휴일로 추석연휴가 길어지면서 6일간의 의료공백으로 환자 불편이 커지는 것을 우려해 대체공휴일인 이날 정상 진료한다고 밝혔다. 글로벌로 활동하는 듯한 신인 걸그룹 캣츠아이인데 얼마전에 한명이 커밍아웃 했다고 해서 찾아보니까 이미 또 레즈가 있다고 해서 감격해서 찾아봄. 하이브 걸그룹 캣츠아이 메간, 나는 양성애자 깜짝 커밍아웃팀내 두 번째 osen유수연 기자 글로벌 걸그룹 캣츠아이katseye의 멤버 메간이 성 정체성을 고백했다. 동해 대형호텔, 선착순 반값 분양사자마자 2억번다. 6970 대중 매체들 또한 메건 폭스를 안젤리나 졸리와 연관성을 지었다.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 19, 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 19, 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 19, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 19, 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.
오사카 엘레지 1936 드라마 야마다 이스즈,오오쿠라 치요코 캣츠 아이 1985 cats eye 공포,스릴러 드류 배리모어,제임스 우즈,앨런 킹 신주쿠 흐트러진 거리 갈 때까지 기다려 1977., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.