Latest news with #ForeignAssistanceAct
Washington Post
01-08-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Sen. Tim Kaine to force votes on conditions for deported migrants
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Virginia) will force votes in the coming weeks meant to compel the Trump administration to answer questions about human rights conditions in six countries to which it deported migrants who are not citizens of those countries. Kaine filed the resolutions Thursday under the Foreign Assistance Act, a 1961 law that allows a single senator to force votes to require the State Department to produce reports on human rights, even though Republicans control the Senate. It's the latest effort by Democrats to pull the limited levers available to them to push back on President Donald Trump's policies and actions.
Euronews
02-07-2025
- Business
- Euronews
USAID closes its doors after six decades amid Trump crackdown
After six decades of operations, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has been ended by US President Donald Trump. The closure is part of the administration's crackdown on the federal government and was one of the prime targets of Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which sought to eliminate 'wasteful' government spending. In 1961, US Congress passed the Foreign Assistance Act, and the then President John F. Kennedy set up USAID as an independent agency through an executive order, merging other agencies into the new federal body. It's mission over the years has been to partner with countries to end extreme poverty and promote resilient, democratic societies. The Trump administration however says that there is 'little to show' for the agency's six decades of work. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio had ordered USAID and its remaining programmes to be absorbed into the State Department by Tuesday. 'Beyond creating a globe-spanning NGO industrial complex at taxpayer expense, USAID has little to show since the end of the Cold War,' Rubio said in a social media post on Tuesday. With only a tiny fraction of the 13,000 staffers and institutional contractors who ran USAID slated to keep their jobs, some said they were labouring to push out what promised funding they could before their systems went offline to the small slice of programmes worldwide that have survived the administration's purge of foreign assistance. 'That ends today,' Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a social media posting Tuesday. American taxpayers would no longer 'pay taxes to fund failed governments in faraway lands," Rubio vowed. Trump moved to dismantle the agency within weeks of assuming office for his second tenure as president. He and Musk accused the agency, with little evidence, of fraud, waste and promoting a leftist and liberal agenda. Supporters say USAID has fundamentally improved health systems and humanitarian networks around the world, promoted democracy and boosted countries and people out of poverty in a way that has saved lives, stemmed refugee crises and wars, and built markets and trading partners for Washington. The Trump administration's new slimmed-down aid system would cut bureaucracy to respond more quickly to crises, empower diplomats out in the field at a reduced number of regional bureaus, and emphasise US trade, not aid, stressed Rubio. Asked for comment about the last days of USAID as an independent agency, the State Department said it would be introducing this week its foreign assistance successor, America First. 'The new process will ensure there is proper oversight and that every tax dollar spent will help advance our national interests,' the department said.
Shafaq News
27-06-2025
- Politics
- Shafaq News
US sanctions Sudan over chemical weapons use
Shafaq News – Washington The United States announced that sanctions targeting Sudan over the alleged use of chemical weapons will officially take effect on Friday, marking a significant escalation in Washington's response to the ongoing conflict in the country. The acting Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security confirmed that Sudan's government used chemical or biological weapons against its own citizens, a violation of international law. Under the sanctions, all non-humanitarian US assistance to Sudan under the 1961 Foreign Assistance Act will be suspended. Only emergency humanitarian aid, food, and agricultural goods are exempt. The measures also prohibit the sale of defense articles, defense services, and construction-related services to Sudan, in line with the Arms Export Control Act. Additionally, all items listed on the US Munitions List are now barred from export. Military financing for Sudan is terminated, and the country is banned from receiving loans, credit guarantees, or financial support from any US agency, including the Export-Import Bank. The sanctions extend to exports of national security-controlled goods and technology listed under the US Commerce Control List (CCL), except in limited, pre-approved cases. A US official noted that some exemptions will be permitted, including applications for licenses to transfer certain defense items to non-governmental actors in Sudan. Export exceptions may also apply for the maintenance of civilian passenger aircraft under previously established guidelines.
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
How the Trump Administration May Redefine Human Rights
Secretary of State Marco Rubio sits nearby as U.S. President Donald Trump meets with President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador in the Oval Office of the White House on April 14, 2025 in Washington, DC. Credit - Win McNamee—Getty Images Every spring, since the late 1970s, the State Department has released the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. This year, those waiting for these documents will have to hold on a bit longer. The Trump Administration is upending decades of precedence to substantially revise the reports. The 2024 version of the reports were initially completed before President Donald Trump took office, but are now being re-edited. When they are released, these reports will now reportedly exclude information on issues such as government efforts to deny freedom of movement and peaceful assembly, failures to retain or provide due process for political prisoners, and the harassment of human rights organizations. The Trump Administration has also signaled it will cut sections about the rights of women, the disabled, and the LGBTQ+ community. These Country Reports offer a detailed account of the state of every country's human rights practices and are meant to inform congressional decisions on foreign aid allocations and security assistance. The reports have taken on added importance over the years. They're increasingly used as a tool to pressure governments to improve their practices, while advocacy organizations and lawyers rely on them to aid in asylum cases and demonstrate fear of persecution. By revising and cutting out substantial sections addressing an array of rights concerns that the U.S. has cared about for almost five decades, the Trump Administration is undermining the definition of human rights as a concept. These State Department reports were first introduced at a key moment in U.S. human rights history—although they did not arrive without controversy. As human rights grew as an important organizing concept in the 1960s and the 1970s around the world, U.S. presidents were largely resistant to incorporating it into U.S. foreign policy decision-making. President Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford's powerful Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, encapsulated this opposition by claiming that taking into account morality or human rights in foreign policy was 'totally devoid of contacts with reality and would lead to empty posturing.' Instead, Kissinger's State Department was dominated by Cold War concerns that relied on a realist approach to foreign policy and focused on great power politics that eschewed concerns like human rights. U.S. Added to Global Human Rights Watchlist Over Declining Civil Liberties In response, as historian Barbara Keys has outlined, Congress tried to pressure State Department officials to reconsider, passing legislation that tied foreign aid to human rights criteria. One important provision that Congress approved was Section 502B of the 1974 Foreign Assistance Act, which, among other measures, requires the Secretary of State to provide annual human rights reports. The reports were one of the first steps by the U.S. government to collect and monitor human rights practices in countries around the globe. It allowed Congress to identify 'gross violators of human rights' and then cut off funding. That authority alone helped the government bring attention to rights issues, educate the public, and apply diplomatic pressure. But the reports were contentious from the beginning. Regional bureaus in the State Department hotly debated what should and should not be included or classified. Some of the first reports were notably restrained in the documentation of abuses, especially compared to the language human rights advocacy groups used to describe violations. Meanwhile, Kissinger remained inflexible in his position, refusing to provide Congress with the reports in 1975. Instead, he only issued an overview of the state of global human rights without determining each country's abuses. The following year, Congress responded by strengthening the reporting provision, requiring that 'a full and complete report' be given to Congress 'with respect to practices regarding the observance of and respect for internationally recognized human rights in each country proposed as a recipient of security assistance.' The reports took on new meaning under President Jimmy Carter's administration. Often considered the 'first human rights president,' Carter and his Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, declassified and publicized these reports, using them to inform policy decisions. Carter broke with a long line of presidents who claimed ignorance about abuses in other countries, seeking to draw lessons from the documentation of such abuses abroad, and using reports to inform decisions about aid and to provide the State Department and advocacy groups with leverage for securing human rights around the globe. President Ronald Reagan, more forceful in his Cold War aims and, like Kissinger, wary of human rights considerations, still adhered to the State Department human rights reporting requirements. While initially using the reports to downplay concerns about violations of social and economic rights, by the latter part of his second term in office, his administration's Country Reports criticized even ally regimes, such as Chile. The administration also used the reports to highlight its goals of democracy promotion, a strategy that aligned with its Cold War policies. By the early 1990s, and with the end of the Cold War, these reports expanded in scope and institutionalized human rights into the practices of the State Department. As political scientist Kathryn Sikkink has argued, the reports required that 'at least one foreign service officer in every embassy around the globe' had to gather systematic information on human rights issues as part of their jobs. Over the decade, the reports grew more detailed, expansive, and accurate, which has made them vital to so many groups in the 21st century. Tracing the emergence of these reports demonstrates that Trump is hardly the first president to politicize his legal responsibility to Congress through its State Department reporting requirements. Debates about what and how much to include in these reports emerged in the first years of the legislative onus and has continued to varying degrees with presidents ever since. Civil and Human Rights Organizations Sue Trump Administration Over DEI, Gender Orders The difference today lays in the scope and scaling back of the current president's vision of human rights. During his first term in office, Trump tried to redefine human rights through then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's Commission on Unalienable Rights, which focused on pairing human rights with religious freedom and decoupling it from reproductive rights. The State Department also sought to pare back Country Reports on abortion and contraceptive issues as well as racial, ethnic, and sexual discrimination. Since January 2025, though, the Trump Administration has not just sought to downplay or deprioritize human rights, but rather to redefine the concept completely. Reporting on impending changes notes that any reference to LGBTQ+ rights is absent. Sections on the ability or right for minorities to participate in the political process, and freedom of expression for citizens, also could be cut. Parts of the report that describe prison conditions are expected to be erased, and corruption in government, especially in administrations friendly to the president, including that of Viktor Orbán in Hungary, may be nixed as well. In essence, the Trump Administration may fulfill its congressional mandate, but only minimally and with implied disregard for the now-internationally recognized idea of human rights. In the aftermath of these potential revisions being leaked, Amnesty International USA raised the alarm, declaring that the shifts signaled that the United States is no longer going to uphold—or hold other countries accountable for upholding—human rights. Along with this stark warning, the history of these reports shows how activists have found ways to raise awareness about human rights around the world. Debbie Sharnak is Assistant Professor of History and International Studies at Rowan University, the author of Of Light and Struggle: Social Justice, Human Rights, and Accountability in Uruguay, and the co-editor of Uruguay in Transnational Perspective. Made by History takes readers beyond the headlines with articles written and edited by professional historians. Learn more about Made by History at TIME here. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of TIME editors. Write to Made by History at madebyhistory@
Time Magazine
21-05-2025
- Politics
- Time Magazine
The Trump Administration is Trying to Change the Historical Definition of Human Rights
Every spring, since the late 1970s, the State Department has released the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. This year, those waiting for these documents will have to hold on a bit longer. The Trump Administration is upending decades of precedence to substantially revise the reports. The 2024 version of the reports were initially completed before President Donald Trump took office, but are now being re-edited. When they are released, these reports will now reportedly exclude information on issues such as government efforts to deny freedom of movement and peaceful assembly, failures to retain or provide due process for political prisoners, and the harassment of human rights organizations. The Trump Administration has also signaled it will cut sections about the rights of women, the disabled, and the LGBTQ+ community. These Country Reports offer a detailed account of the state of every country's human rights practices and are meant to inform congressional decisions on foreign aid allocations and security assistance. The reports have taken on added importance over the years. They're increasingly used as a tool to pressure governments to improve their practices, while advocacy organizations and lawyers rely on them to aid in asylum cases and demonstrate fear of persecution. By revising and cutting out substantial sections addressing an array of rights concerns that the U.S. has cared about for almost five decades, the Trump Administration is undermining the definition of human rights as a concept. These State Department reports were first introduced at a key moment in U.S. human rights history—although they did not arrive without controversy. As human rights grew as an important organizing concept in the 1960s and the 1970s around the world, U.S. presidents were largely resistant to incorporating it into U.S. foreign policy decision-making. President Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford's powerful Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, encapsulated this opposition by claiming that taking into account morality or human rights in foreign policy was 'totally devoid of contacts with reality and would lead to empty posturing.' Instead, Kissinger's State Department was dominated by Cold War concerns that relied on a realist approach to foreign policy and focused on great power politics that eschewed concerns like human rights. In response, as historian Barbara Keys has outlined, Congress tried to pressure State Department officials to reconsider, passing legislation that tied foreign aid to human rights criteria. One important provision that Congress approved was Section 502B of the 1974 Foreign Assistance Act, which, among other measures, requires the Secretary of State to provide annual human rights reports. The reports were one of the first steps by the U.S. government to collect and monitor human rights practices in countries around the globe. It allowed Congress to identify 'gross violators of human rights' and then cut off funding. That authority alone helped the government bring attention to rights issues, educate the public, and apply diplomatic pressure. But the reports were contentious from the beginning. Regional bureaus in the State Department hotly debated what should and should not be included or classified. Some of the first reports were notably restrained in the documentation of abuses, especially compared to the language human rights advocacy groups used to describe violations. Meanwhile, Kissinger remained inflexible in his position, refusing to provide Congress with the reports in 1975. Instead, he only issued an overview of the state of global human rights without determining each country's abuses. The following year, Congress responded by strengthening the reporting provision, requiring that 'a full and complete report' be given to Congress 'with respect to practices regarding the observance of and respect for internationally recognized human rights in each country proposed as a recipient of security assistance.' The reports took on new meaning under President Jimmy Carter's administration. Often considered the 'first human rights president,' Carter and his Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, declassified and publicized these reports, using them to inform policy decisions. Carter broke with a long line of presidents who claimed ignorance about abuses in other countries, seeking to draw lessons from the documentation of such abuses abroad, and using reports to inform decisions about aid and to provide the State Department and advocacy groups with leverage for securing human rights around the globe. President Ronald Reagan, more forceful in his Cold War aims and, like Kissinger, wary of human rights considerations, still adhered to the State Department human rights reporting requirements. While initially using the reports to downplay concerns about violations of social and economic rights, by the latter part of his second term in office, his administration's Country Reports criticized even ally regimes, such as Chile. The administration also used the reports to highlight its goals of democracy promotion, a strategy that aligned with its Cold War policies. By the early 1990s, and with the end of the Cold War, these reports expanded in scope and institutionalized human rights into the practices of the State Department. As political scientist Kathryn Sikkink has argued, the reports required that 'at least one foreign service officer in every embassy around the globe' had to gather systematic information on human rights issues as part of their jobs. Over the decade, the reports grew more detailed, expansive, and accurate, which has made them vital to so many groups in the 21st century. Tracing the emergence of these reports demonstrates that Trump is hardly the first president to politicize his legal responsibility to Congress through its State Department reporting requirements. Debates about what and how much to include in these reports emerged in the first years of the legislative onus and has continued to varying degrees with presidents ever since. The difference today lays in the scope and scaling back of the current president's vision of human rights. During his first term in office, Trump tried to redefine human rights through then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's Commission on Unalienable Rights, which focused on pairing human rights with religious freedom and decoupling it from reproductive rights. The State Department also sought to pare back Country Reports on abortion and contraceptive issues as well as racial, ethnic, and sexual discrimination. Since January 2025, though, the Trump Administration has not just sought to downplay or deprioritize human rights, but rather to redefine the concept completely. Reporting on impending changes notes that any reference to LGBTQ+ rights is absent. Sections on the ability or right for minorities to participate in the political process, and freedom of expression for citizens, also could be cut. Parts of the report that describe prison conditions are expected to be erased, and corruption in government, especially in administrations friendly to the president, including that of Viktor Orbán in Hungary, may be nixed as well. In essence, the Trump Administration may fulfill its congressional mandate, but only minimally and with implied disregard for the now-internationally recognized idea of human rights. In the aftermath of these potential revisions being leaked, Amnesty International USA raised the alarm, declaring that the shifts signaled that the United States is no longer going to uphold—or hold other countries accountable for upholding—human rights. Along with this stark warning, the history of these reports shows how activists have found ways to raise awareness about human rights around the world. Debbie Sharnak is Assistant Professor of History and International Studies at Rowan University, the author of Of Light and Struggle: Social Justice, Human Rights, and Accountability in Uruguay, and the co-editor of Uruguay in Transnational Perspective.
