State Department’s new human rights reports are silent. We refuse to be

In Dhaka, Bangladesh, a young gay man who traveled five hours to meet us at the US ambassador’s residence softly spoke about the violence he endured. For years, activists like him met with American officials to tell their stories and trusted our government to publicize their truth for the world. Last week, the Trump administration betrayed that trust and abandoned decades of bipartisan work. Instead of fair and accurate reporting, we systematically removed almost all references to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex (LGBTQI+) abuse and persecution.

Mandated by Congress since the 1970s, the HRR covers all countries in the world. They are essential resources for courts, governments, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in assessing human rights violations, allocation of resources, and creating development policies. Although the report originally did not cover anti-LGBTQI+ violence, sustained education and advocacy from our community has led the Democratic administrations, including the Republicans and the last Trump administration, to document abuse based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and annual sexual characteristics for the past 20 years.

These reports were a priority when we served as the office of the US Special Envoy for LGBTQI+ Rights. During our services, we have reviewed reports from embassies, the United Nations, NGOs, universities, the media and most importantly, the survivors themselves. By the time I left the government in January, all country reports included a dedicated, robust section documenting abuses against LGBTQI+ people.

These sections filled the voids. They mapped where US human rights investments can do the best reinforcement work by human rights advocates, foreign governments and allies, making the world safer for LGBTQI+ people. They helped asylum judges assess claims from LGBTQI people fleeing persecution. They told activists they had seen their struggle.

This year, the Trump administration opposed it. After a long delay, they released them last week during the Congress summer break to fill the truth. They erased the entire category of abuse and watered down others against women, workers, indigenous people, people of African descent, Roman and LGBTQI+ people. The LGBTQI+ section has been removed completely. There is little to nothing in keyword searches in every report we read. There is no “LGBTQI+”, essentially “sexual orientation”, “gender identity” or “intersex”. Some references remain are shortened, sanitized and buried deeply.

Reading the 2024 chapters of Uganda and Russia, you may believe that neither country has LGBTQI+ people or abuse. However, if you read the 2023 report, you will see 45 reports of anti-LGBTQI+ abuse in Uganda and 36 reports in Russia. Obviously, it is impossible to resolve such systemic abuse for a year. Instead, our State Department has removed references to most of the worst abuses of LGBTQI+ people around the world.

In Iraq, for example, lawmakers passed anti-LGBTQI+ laws that equated homosexuality with “prostitution,” punishing same-sex relationships in prisons for up to 15 years. However, that law, reported in 2023, has not been mentioned. The same applies to the Kyrgyz Republic. There, the nationwide “LGBTQI+ Propaganda” law forced the shutdown of perhaps the country’s oldest LGBTQI+ service provider. It’s not mentioned. And in Afghanistan, all reported last year’s unspeakable behavior of anti-LGBTQI+ violence and abuse is no longer available.

This erasure is intentional. It tells authoritarian governments that they can abuse minorities with immunity. It also shows Americans that LGBTQI+ equality will land here, just as the Supreme Court received a petition to overturn marriage equality.

But here is the truth. What we erased never beat us. Vision is always the most powerful tool of our movement, and history shows that it cannot be rejected forever. From Stonewall to American marriage equality, from countries around the world who have broken sodomy laws and codified trans rights, LGBTQI+ have always overcome silence with courage and tenacity. Crossing the continent, when they try to erase us, we turn exclusion into progress.

The administration that refused to report human rights violations of LGBTQI+ people and other marginalized groups is a political act, not an accident. We recommend you: (202) Call today’s US Senators and Representatives via 224-3121, confront the administration by not doing work at HRRS, pass Senate Bill S. 2611, and ask future reports to cover LGBTQI+ rights and other major categories. We urge other governments to expand their own reports to strictly document and condemn abuse. We can all bridge the gap by increasing high-quality data from NGOs, universities and think tanks that have already set global standards for reporting the situation for LGBTQI+ people around the world.

The administration can rewrite its reports to suit the narrow view of the world, but it cannot erase the courage of those who tell their stories and the victory we have already won. Our history as LGBTQI+ Americans proves that once it has been claimed, we cannot fill our vision for a long time. The task before us is simple and urgent. It’s about asserting the truth, defending it in every forum, and moving it forward until equality exceeds elimination.

Jessica Stern is a senior researcher at the Car Ryan Center at Harvard Kennedy School, co-founder of the Alliance of Diplomacy and Justice, and is the principal, an organization co-founded by eight former ambassadors, special representatives and special envoys who advocate for human rights in US foreign policy. She is a former executive director at Attright International and a former US envoy for LGBTQI+ human rights.

Suzanne B. Goldberg He is a law professor at Herbert and Doriswexler at Columbia Law School and a former senior advisor to the Special Envoys Bureau to advance LGBTQI+ human rights.

Reggie Greer is a global LGBTQI+ fellow at Harvard Kennedy School and a former Biden Harris administration appointee, serving as Senior Advisor to the US Envoy to advance LGBTQI+ human rights, and is Director and Senior Advisor for the White House, a priority for LGBTQI+ engagements.