When I first moved to Thailand in the 1990s to work with a small human rights organization, we waited for the annual U.S. State Department’s human rights report with bated breath. It was not because we anticipated information we did not already know, but because it provided critical external validation that gave us support and protection.
The State Department’s reports have served as an anchor worldwide, holding everyone to a universal standard, calling balls and strikes based on clear indicators and grounded in international law. The report has been used to protect the vulnerable, as governments find it harder to swat away than reports by domestic monitors, and report findings have even been used in courts of law to back asylum claims.
The latest human rights report for 2024, put out last week by the Trump administration, is an extreme departure from decades of painstaking tracking of global human rights. It eliminates multiple critical human rights indicators, redefining in many ways who qualifies as human (or at a minimum prioritizes which humans are most important). It therefore fails to paint a useful picture of the actual situation in most countries as key developments are not even mentioned.
The report does, however, provide an accurate description — by what it does and does not include — of what the U.S. has become, our values and priorities.
This human rights report differs from previous ones through omission more than addition. All the rights and freedoms associated with democracy — and championed by the U.S. for decades — are no longer tracked and measured. Freedoms of assembly, association and personal expression, right to a fair trial, and freedom to participate in the political process might be mentioned in passing in various segments of the country chapter but no longer have their own, in-depth sections as in the past. Further, assessments of elections, political parties and participation, corruption, and treatment of human rights and democracy organizations have ceased.
Who qualifies as “human” in human rights has been significantly narrowed. The State Department had spent decades documenting important indicators for women’s rights, creating unique sections of the report, including those on discrimination, gender-based violence, rape and domestic violence. None of these are included in the latest report. The only indicator remaining to track the quality of life for 51 percent of the world’s population is the issue of forced sterilization. The gay and transgender community is completely ignored, allowing for assessments of nations that not only discriminate but support active violent campaigns against gay people to get a more positive human rights rating.
Where sections of the report were maintained, such as those related to labor, freedom of the press and extrajudicial killings, the details are limited. In fact, the report is significantly shorter than in previous years. Rather than listing numerous examples of violations, this year’s report frequently provides only one example, if any, allowing governments to minimize the severity.
Where the report has emphasized coverage is on the issue of antisemitism, which has always been an important indicator to track and has its own section, separate from religious freedom. Religious-based discrimination and abuse of other groups — whether Islamophobia or attacks on Roma and other minority ethno-religious or tribal populations — do not have the same status and coverage is limited even though these forms of discrimination are more common in many parts of the world.
The report thus fails in one of its main objectives — to inform people about the actual human rights situation in a given place. For example, in 2024, Georgia had a complete democratic breakdown — an election that was neither free nor fair, massive crackdown on individual assembly and expression, a ban on the political opposition, widespread corruption, a captured legal system, violence against members of the gay and transgender community, and illegal and unjust parliamentary inquiries that have ended up with political leaders in prison.
One would not know this by reading State’s report, which covers very little of the current crisis. Hungary, the literal European poster child for authoritarianism and strongman rule — from coopting the courts, media and judiciary, to restricting the rights of women, gay and transgender citizens and the horrific treatment of ethnic minorities and migrants — has an introduction in the report with a mere three sentences, all claiming the country has no significant human rights violations or problems.
In addition to harming the credibility of U.S. expertise and analysis, the report provides excellent cover for autocratic and abusive regimes. Ignoring completely the rights of women gives a large pass to Gulf nations, for example, which now, according to the U.S., are not such bad human rights abusers after all. The elimination of corruption covers is also a boon to corrupt governments the world over.
The report thus simultaneously undercuts — and puts at risk — the careful and dangerous work of domestic human rights organizations, like the Thai group I once worked for, that can no longer be comforted by U.S. backing. Rather, regimes can potentially go after domestic watchdogs and use U.S. reporting in their defense.
The report also demonstrates our abandonment of soft power and creates opportunities for our adversaries — together with the evisceration of foreign aid. The U.S. has led the world in promoting democracy, for example, standing up for free and fair elections, rule of law, and political pluralism, and this report demonstrates this is no longer a priority.
While it is focused internationally, this year’s human rights report paints a picture of who we have become. Which rights we choose to include or omit and whose rights we think are important (and whose are not) reflect a shift in our values and priorities. If fair elections and women’s lives do not matter elsewhere, why would they matter here? Americans should not be complacent — if we don’t respect rights elsewhere, we don’t respect them anywhere, including at home.
Laura Thornton is a global democracy expert who spent 25 years overseas in Asia and the former Soviet Union working for democracy and human rights organizations. She has previously served in leadership roles at the German Marshall Fund, International IDEA, and the National Democratic Institute.
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