Oversight
Mike Pompeo’s Human Rights Commission Is a Sham
The secretary of state’s whole career has revolved around excusing human rights violations and cozying up to dictators
With the Trump administration continuing to garner international headlines for caging hundreds of innocent children at the border, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo apparently decided now would be a good time to announce a new “bipartisan” panel assembled to undertake “an informed review of the role of human rights in American foreign policy.”
Billed as the Commission on Unalienable Rights, Pompeo claims the panel will follow in the tradition of Eleanor Roosevelt’s historic Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But his remarks christening the commission on Monday made clear the real purpose was to redefine the term “human rights” altogether.
“What does it mean to say, or claim, that something is in fact a human right?” Pompeo said. “How do we know, or how do we determine that this — or that — is a human right. Is it true, and therefore ought it to be honored?”
Presidential administrations have long been erratic and hypocritical in their approach to human rights.
