December 17, 2024 • 40 mins
Human rights are born out of the belief that every individual is equal and deserving of life, dignity, respect, and freedom. States must then deliver on those obligations. But through nominations, harmful policy, and mass confusion, the returning administration has a broad ability to dissolve human rights. Rori Kramer, Director of U.S. Advocacy at the American Jewish World Service, sits down to talk with us about the foundations of human rights and what we can expect from the coming administration.
Human rights were codified via the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with the U.S. as an early champion. When these rights were established, they were indivisible and applied to all humans equally. At present, in some countries, authoritarian governments seek to criminalize democracy and the exercise of human rights. Some of these states are feeling empowered by the U.S. and its direction-- especially as the U.S. plays in outsized role in international human rights standards. In the first Trump administration, the Geneva Consensus Declaration and Commission on Unalienable Rights were used to shift and mold the framework of what human rights really are; those may return.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Repro Fight Back a podcast on all
things related to sexual andreproductive health rights and
justice. Hi, re pros. How'severybody doing? I'm your host
Jenny Wetter , and my pronounsare she her. So y'all, can you
believe this week marks sevenyears of this podcast? I cannot
(00:24):
believe that I have beenhosting this podcast for that
long. Honestly, if you hadasked me when we had
our launch party seven yearsago, if I would still be doing
this, I would've not believedthat seven years later we would
still be going strong. I amfeeling so lucky to have one.
Such a wonderful audience.
Thank you all. I feel lucky tohave such amazing conversations
(00:47):
with so many wonderful guests.
Like I've talked to so manyamazing people over the seven
years of the podcast, that itall feels kind of unreal. I am
so grateful for the amazingteam that we have at re pros,
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which is generally behind thescenes, so you don't see it,
(01:08):
but Rachel is in charge ofmaking sure that you get
wonderful show notes andkeeping the website up to date
, and she does so much otherstuff. Um , most importantly,
this week Rachel released anamazing new brief that she
wrote on the Helms Amendmentand it's harms. So definitely
check that out. I'll make surethat Rachel includes a link to
(01:30):
her brief in the show notesbecause y'all, you should read
it. It is a wonderful productand I am just, congratulations,
Rachel. You did a great job. Um, and Elena , who does our
social media, they just do anoutstanding job with our social
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(01:54):
strong, making sure that thepodcast gets out there. Oh,
Elena also does the transcriptsto make sure that y'all can
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would not be what we are nowwithout Rachel and Elena . And
also just super grateful to Megwho does our editing, so that I
sound like I know what I'mtalking about and sound my
(02:16):
best. So thank you, Meg. Iappreciate all of the work that
you have done helping launchand doing editing for the
podcast for seven years. Imean, and Rachel has been with
me for the entire seven yearstoo. So like, this is amazing.
I'm just so grateful to thePopulation Institute for all of
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(02:40):
director for the podcast. And ,um, you know, especially to my
old boss, Bob, who pushed meinto doing the podcast, I could
not imagine that it would bejust the absolute favorite part
of my job when , uh, when hehad asked me to do it. And I
very firmly was not interested. Uh , so just really
(03:00):
thankful that he pushed me toget me to do it, because I've
had such a wonderful timehaving so many amazing
conversations with suchwonderful guests. And if you
have been with me for sevenyears or if today is your first
episode, thank you so much. Um,I am so grateful to each and
every one of you and , uh, ifyou enjoy the podcast, I hope
(03:23):
you will share it with yourfriends. Write and review us on
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(03:47):
Jane that talk about , uh,let's see. We have ones that
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(04:32):
you get the stickers for 50,you get the stickers in the
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thing. I feel like there's somuch housekeeping in this
episode, sorry about that. Butreally important, we are gonna
take the next two weeks off.
Repro comes out on ChristmasEve and New Year's Eve this
(04:53):
year, so we just decided thatwe would take it off and we'll
see you all next year. It's areally good chance for us to
just step away and take sometime off and just relax and get
all prepared for everything weare going to be dealing with
next year. So we will be gonefor the next two weeks, but we
will see everybody next year.
(05:17):
Okay, y'all, that was so much,and I think we'll just go to
this week's episode. Sorry thatthe up top was basically all
housekeeping, but I am veryexcited for this week's
episode. We are talking to RoryKramer at the American Jewish
World Service about humanrights. It seemed like, you
know, we talk about humanrights a lot on the podcast and
(05:39):
how the issues we care aboutand work on our human rights,
but maybe it was time to take astep back and just talk about
what are human rights and totalk about the ways they're
going to be under attack duringthe next administration. So
with that, let's turn to myinterview with Rory. Hi Rory.
(05:59):
Thank you so much for beinghere today.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Thanks so much, Jenny . So excited to be here
with you.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
I am very excited to talk to you today, one, because
you're amazing, but two, we aregonna talk about human rights,
which is something we like,talk about a lot on the podcast
and that like, reaper rightsare human rights, trans rights
are human rights. But we don'tnecessarily get down to the
like nitty gritty of like, whatdo we mean when we talk about
human rights? But the reallyimportant thing is, before I do
(06:27):
that, maybe we should have youintroduce yourself. Sometimes I
get so excited to have theconversation. I start before I
do the important part, wouldyou like to introduce yourself
and include your pronouns?
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Absolutely. I'm Rory Kramer. I use she her pronouns
, uh, and I'm the director ofUS advocacy in American Jewish
World Service.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Okay. Now that we got the like work part out of
the way, let's have theconversation. I am really
excited, like I said, to talkabout human rights. Do you
maybe wanna tell us a littlebit of like big picture? Like
what, what are we talking aboutwhen we say human rights?
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Absolutely. So, you know, human rights are born out
of the belief that everyindividual is equal and
deserving of life, dignity,respect, freedom , uh, and then
human rights takes thosebeliefs and identifies what is
needed for human flourishingand places those obligations on
states to deliver them wheneverthose rights start right to
life, right to politicalparticipation, right, to a fair
(07:24):
trial. And you know, I thinkfor those of us that work in
these areas, whether they besectoral or broader human
rights, we all know, but worthrepeating that, you know, these
were all codified after WorldWar II by the international
community. And in fact, goodtiming, Jenny , that this is
actually the 76th anniversaryof the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights being ratified andadopted at the un. And it's
(07:47):
also kind of sad since the , this is a , a time
when they are more under athreat than ever, really. And
another kind of sad part aboutit is that the US was an early
champion of these values,right? A leader among all the
nations and getting themadopted and in deploying the
resources to communities aroundthe world facing poverty and
(08:07):
persecution. And I think it'ssomething to keep in mind
before we get even more intothe nitty gritty, is that when
these rights were established,they were enumerated applying
to all human beings equally,regardless of origin, status,
race, religion, nationality,gender. And they were also
really focused on beingindivisible. You know, the ,
(08:29):
the declaration pointedlydeclined to elevate certain
rights above others because theauthors were well , uh, too
aware of that . This opened thepath to selective
interpretations of theseprinciples. And, you know, some
of the most fundamental textsthat the international
community relies on since thenhave elaborated on this theme.
So in the United Nations 1993Vienna Declaration, it stated
(08:51):
explicitly that all humanrights were universal,
indivisible, interdependent,and interrelated. And I think
it's so important to keep theinterrelated part in mind. Not
only because obviously theforces that are looking to take
away our basic human rights arealways trying to segment us
out, but really because of the,the way the work that HWS does
is so interrelated and I thinkso much of the partners that we
(09:15):
work with. So if I could take amoment now to take a step back
and talk about the work we doto sort of set up the, you
know, so I can really expressthe how impressive the work our
partners are and how it helpsreally educate us here in the
United States. So we're a grantmaking and advocacy
organization that is dedicatedto champion human rights around
the world. Wonderful lawlaudable goal that I'm sure a
(09:37):
lot of other organizationshold. But we do this in a
really sort of unique way. Sowe fund more than 500 social
change and human rightsorganizations in Africa, Asia,
Latin American, the Caribbean,in the areas of sexual health
and rights, civil and politicalrights, land, water , climate
justice. And then on certainoccasions, disaster
(09:58):
humanitarian relief. And we dothis by also accompanying those
grantees with our local staffwho share the knowledge , uh,
and the social movements on theground, and bringing those
grantees together and emboldenthose movements. And then
finally where I come into thepicture is that we advocate ,
uh, in Washington and sometimesinternationally to shift those
(10:19):
laws and policies to promotehuman rights work and
strengthen those grassrootsefforts in their countries
because of the outsized rolethe United States plays. And
that really is predicating allof our US work, right? That no
matter what the US is reallyholding outsized role, whether
for good or for bad, to makethe enabling environment for
our partners even easier. So,you know, we are now in a
(10:42):
position where I think for thefirst time, the United States
citizens can kind of see thework that our partners are are
doing. So to get back to theirwork, you know, in the
countries where we work, thecriminalization of human rights
is never an issue areacriminalization that we think
of it in dc I , you know ,authoritarian governments seek
(11:03):
to criminalize the exercise ofdemocracy, the, the defense of
rule of law or civic space. Andthey don't specify often on
particular rights of the peoplethey're fighting for. Sometimes
there's obviously individualhideous laws, right? Like
what's going on in Uganda nowwith the Anti Homosexuality
Act. But ultimately it is aconstriction of that civic
(11:23):
space and of the exercise ofpeople's basic dignity in human
rights. And so the challengingof the government abuse to
violate those rights is reallywhat those governments perceive
as the threat, regardless ofthe rights that they're
fighting for. So we see sooften across our issue areas
and across our geographiccoverage, that those movements
(11:46):
are working together to defendthose rights. So for example,
in a country like Nicaraguademanding sexual and
reproductive health and rightsof the communities they support
and the communities are equallyaffected by their violations of
the civil and political rightsbecause the entire country is
living under a dictatorialsystem that desires its
citizens its rights. Similarly,in El Salvador where abortion
(12:07):
is entirely illegal, includingtherapeutic abortion, feminist
groups are threatened andharassed by the state because
that is how the authoritariansrespond to the challenging of
their power. So not to pivottoo , too much to the United
States right off the bat, butyou know, we see we were
already starting to see that,that these authoritarians are
feeling emboldened by theelection of Trump. And then in
(12:31):
turn, some of the Republicanefforts in Congress already
that are seeking to shrinkcivic space to mirror some of
the efforts of some of theseauthoritarian , uh, governments
already, I think I've beensaying since the election, you
know, hugging dictatorsanywhere is good for dictators
everywhere. So it's thisvicious circle and loop of the
(12:55):
more we're emboldening anydictators, all dictators
everywhere are like coming tothe party and excited to be
able to sort of share bestpractices. Well,
Speaker 1 (13:04):
That obviously leads me to think about like some of
the things that happened in thefirst Trump administration
where there was like, not justactions they took that impacted
people's human rights, but likean actual attack on the human
rights framework itself. Um ,with things like the
Unalienable Rights Commissionand the even consensus
(13:26):
declaration, which trademark ,uh, Rachel Moynihan was neither
in Geneva, nor was it aconsensus document
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Discuss amongst yourselves . Yeah,
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Exactly. Um, so I are , are we thinking we're
gonna face some of these samelike actual attacks on the way
human rights are talked about?
Like versus like just, justversus like direct attacks on
the exercise of rights. Doesthat make sense?
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Why choose Jenny ?
Why choose? I
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Mean both are gonna happen. , maybe let's
start with the like big picturethen. You know,
Speaker 2 (14:00):
I think for your listeners that are familiar
with both the Geneva Consensusand the commission unalienable
rights, I'd say first off,sorry. Yeah. Um, and second
off. Yeah, I think those arejust the starting points,
right? They're going to pickthese things up and, and start
from there. I actually was abit more familiar with the
commission unalienable rights.
Uh, sadly for me, I attendedevery public meeting , um,
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Sorry,
Speaker 2 (14:21):
It was un it was unpleasant personally, but
also, you know, from a humanrights perspective, it was a
mockery of human rights , uh,having, I believe at the time
no members that had actuallybeen part parcel pre the
practice of human rights. And,you know, certainly a mockery
of government commissions thatat purport to actually care
about advancing policy and whatit also did pretty, pretty
(14:44):
clearly and, and was reallyreactionary specifically on an
abuse of religious freedom,right? Trump's folks did and
certainly will continue in thisadministration to sort of
confuse the freedom to worship,which is a human right and
grossly confuse it with thestate license to advance their
own particular brand ofreligious expression. And we
saw this really, really clearlywith the commission where they
(15:06):
came out with that the, themost important at the top of
the pinnacle are propertyrights, which when you talk
about property rights andAmerica's founding documents,
there's also a lot of likecreepy racism tied in there,
but also religious freedom.
And, but they didn't meanreligious freedom for you and
me, Jenny , and they certainlydidn't mean religious freedom
for anyone besides their veryspecific sort of white
(15:29):
Christian nationalism form,which is, you know, frankly
un-American, even though thatwas certainly what the founders
had at the time. But when youlook at the, the advancement of
the United States and of ourfounding documents, they have
progressed to be in the 21stcentury. And that is absolutely
not, and to be honest, we'regonna evoke founding fathers.
(15:49):
And I know that he is notimmune from critique, but
Thomas Jefferson actually wentout of his way at the time to
make sure there was no stateestablished religion. That's
actually one of the things hewas most proud of. So it was
really laughable when MikePompeo and his goons were like,
oh, no, no, no, we're gonnaignore that part, but we're
gonna like embrace the cyberpart . , um, sorry,
(16:12):
that was a little bit ofeditorial there.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
I mean, again, it goes back to what you were
talking about at the beginning,which is like these rights are
indivisible, like mm-hmm . You can't,
there's not a hierarchy likethat the US was trying to
create then.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
Absolutely. And you know, certainly it's very
difficult to look at somethingthat is about the unalienable
commission on human rights andthen also not talk about
anything that's happened in the20th, the 21st century around
human rights was laughable, notto steal any of Rachel
Moynihan's thunder, but I alsothink that this was not a
commission because it believedthat they were in violation of
several US regulations aroundcommissions. It was not really
(16:48):
grounded in human rights. And Ido believe that the Declaration
of Independence talked about aninalienable Right. Not an
unalienable . Right. So thatalways really annoyed me as
well. But you know, that'sneither Oh ,
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Talk about me typing it all the time. And I always
was trying to do it
Speaker 2 (17:03):
The wrong way.
Absolutely. So, you know, likethat's just an , I think we
should just rename it asanother, you know. No thanks
Mike Pompeo . You know,I just think that a lot of your
listeners are also probablyvery familiar with what a lot
of the actors that were behindboth of these things have been
doing the last four years, andit's not been , um, doing other
productive things. It's beentrying to advance these two
really faulty and offensiveregimes abroad where they could
(17:26):
in countries that also do notreally have democracy or are
authoritarian curious andmoving forward with it there.
And really, and we , ourpartners have actually seen
some very us fingerprints,let's just put it that way, on
a lot of the work they weredoing in trying to protect
their own human rights, whetherthey be SHR or otherwise in
(17:47):
their own countries. And soit's, you know, it's very, very
disheartening to know, not onlyhas that work been continuing
unabated abroad, but now the USbully pulpit, which obviously
just is not perfect and comeswith lots of strings attached,
but there has been in the pasta US bully pulpit where they
have the US government speakingout on behalf of those
(18:08):
marginalized communities, evenif the actions have not been
there. But at least speakingout , uh, and now the , the
bully puppet will be used fullyto, to take away their rights.
So I, I think that we'll seeattacks formulated and grounded
in religious freedom, which areobviously to take away other
people's human rights. As youcan imagine, many of our
supporters , uh, American Jewsaround the country and clergy
(18:31):
are grossly offended by thisand wanna mobilize on this.
They wanted to mobilize on itfour years ago, and I can't
imagine that they're going tofeel that this speaks on behalf
of them. And I imagine millionsof other Americans will feel
like this does not speak onbehalf of them .
Speaker 1 (18:45):
Yeah. Thinking of like the work that has been
done in the last four years,and like I'm sure polishing
their work, bringing othercountries on board or working
to get them to come on boardwhen the documents open up
again or, or coming intopractice again, like worried to
see those people coming backmm-hmm
Speaker 2 (19:05):
. And
they all, and they all have
great jobs ahead of them , realfancy jobs. And I think that as
you brought up, like individualefforts legislatively or big
picture or internationally orregulatory in the executive
branch, I , I think we see allof those, and not only because
they have the ability to, butbecause that's part of the plan
(19:26):
is to overwhelm to everythingbe whack-a-mole. And it is, it
is tiring. You know, I thinkwe've already seen with some
bills that were on the flooralmost as test cases in the
last few months, but we willabsolutely see in Congress
moving forward are these billsaround the closing of civic
space. So that is, you know,anti-terrorism, pro
transparency, all the thingsthat are good and wonderful and
(19:49):
we all support, but the proofis in the pudding or the
devil's in the details orwhatever, whatever euphemism
you wanna use are absolutelygonna be true here because
there is no benefit foranybody, whether it's abroad or
at home with having a closedcivic space with the control of
a authoritarian government. Youknow, the , the fewer civil
(20:10):
society organizations there areanywhere is bad. And using a
government arm around taxes oraround funding as the, I guess
the, the stick with very littlecarrot is not diplomacy. It is
just authoritarian curious. AndI think a lot of Trump's allies
(20:31):
have seen this work abroad. Ourpartners certainly have seen
this work against them abroad.
Uh, and so we're very concernedabout those pieces of
legislation. And in particulararound transparency pieces. The
, uh, government already hasnames and addresses of people
that are subcontractees, but tomake those things public for
public transparency, I'm usingair quotes here, it could
(20:53):
actually be a kill list forpartners that we have partners
around the world where theirnames and their addresses would
be incredibly personallydangerous to them because they
are criminalized and theactivities they do in their
countries. You know, I thinkfor this, you see certainly
that SRHR groups at home andabroad, but certainly now more
at home than we've ever seenbefore, are going to be the
(21:15):
canary in the coal mine. But asI mentioned earlier, they are
in partnership and should be inpartnership with democracy
activists everywhere. So assoon as you see one of these
groups start to be attacked, weshould all take heart that
everybody's human rights areabout to be abused. And, you
know, I I I think thatsticking, I guess still to the,
(21:38):
the legislative andcongressional piece of this
'cause that sometimes is alittle bit more public than the
regulatory things that they'regonna do in the executive
branch is that, you know,bipartisan, I hate saying this,
but bipartisanship for the mostpart could be a mirage. You
know, we don't want the resultof this election to be, okay,
well we should do more workwith Trump because that's what
(22:01):
the American people wanted.
Without a careful eye that, youknow, just something being
bipartisan is not good . A goodin and of itself, this is
absolutely not your father'sRepublican party. There are not
a lot of efforts that I haveseen, and I have worked in
Washington for a quarter ofcentury , which sounds
like a lot saying it that way,in and out of government in the
(22:23):
, on the hill, in the executivebranch, certainly in the
nonprofit and an advocacycommunity. And this is not
where we were 25 years ago.
This is not where we were 15years ago. And there are not a
lot of good faith effort actorswho want to do something that
is bipartisan for its sake. SoI am imploring so many of our
allies on, on the Hill to lookat something with a very keen
(22:45):
and watchful eye and not dosomething just because it is
bipartisan. And I think these,these Trojan horse transparency
and anti anti-terrorism billsare a great example. Like there
are times that you're just notgonna be able to do a
bipartisan thing on thisbecause the thing itself that
they're asking you to do isundemocratic. And I mean that
(23:06):
in the lowercase d democratic , it is not, does not
comport with the rule of law.
And it does not comport with anAmerican tradition of
democracy. You know, and Ithink it's really important for
all of us, both in and out ofgovernment, and that it also
includes just regular citizensto remember that there are
really no guardrails. Likeguardrails are people, it is
just people. And this isreally, really important for
(23:30):
you to remember that you needto bring a clear eye and
vigilance to sort of all ofyour reasoning behind , whether
it's legislation, policydeterminations, personnel
decisions that theadministration's gonna be
making, that we are the onesthat are here to protect us.
There is, there is nothingelse.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
I think this is such an important conversation and I
think maybe we wanna take likea quick little , uh, second
that we're familiar with, butmaybe the audience isn't super
familiar with. And talk just alittle bit about the
anti-terrorism bill piece'cause mm-hmm .
While it's something that wehave been talking about and
concerned about, I think ithasn't necessarily broken out
(24:08):
in the same way and just , um,do like a really quick, like
3000 foot level of like, what,what was in this bill that we
were so worried about.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Absolutely. Um, can I take an extra step back just
to make it big picture around,of course , this was a , a tax
bill, which as somebody whospent my career in US foreign
policy and also, you know,human rights, I was like, tax
what? You know, I think thatit's important to remember that
they , it's the same issues andthey're just gonna find a lot
of different buckets to putthem in. And so that's why I
(24:38):
feel like a lot of needing
Speaker 1 (24:39):
To have eyes everywhere, needing
Speaker 2 (24:41):
To have eyes everywhere. I am lucky, one of
my good friends is a tax policyexpert in Washington, but like,
gosh, if this moves to likeLabor standard , I don't know
any labor people. So like we'reall so segmented in Washington.
It's, it's , it could bedangerous, but, so, you know, I
think a lot of us, and probablya lot of your former guests
have been calling these billsTrojan horse bills , which I
actually think is not even fairbecause my kids love the ID and
(25:04):
the Odyssey and like, you know,well , well obviously the
Trojans are the good guysanyway, but whatever, it only
even makes me sad for that andthis because these are things
that on their face seem fine.
And so this bill in particularthat I was referring to is a
bill that would revoke the taxexempt status of any
organization in the US thatuses its money to support
(25:27):
terrorism. Who is against that?
No one is against that.
Everyone supports that. Butfirst of all, and probably most
important, that's alreadyillegal. So like what kind of
problem are we solving for? Arewe solving for an actual
problem, Jenny ? No, we are notsolving for an actual problem.
We are solving for anauthoritarian curious problem,
which is to close civic space.
(25:48):
Because in the current statusto become a a terrorist group
and a terrorist supportinggroup, there has to be actual
evidence in the rule of law anda very deliberate and slow
bureaucratic process, right? Sothe process that everyone
bemoans, all bureaucracy isactually here a protection and
part of the rule of law. So notonly does it exist, but there's
(26:09):
already a process that peoplecan go back and look at and
it's public. This bill wouldpurport to do it all with like
secret evidence and likeevidence that the Secretary of
Treasury that would control alot of this wouldn't
necessarily need to share. Soregardless of who the president
is and who the Secretary ofTreasury is, it's a dangerous
precedent and one that ourpartners have seen in their
(26:32):
countries. And I should restatethat we only operate in
countries and by we say AWSonly operates in countries that
have a problem with democracyor already authoritarian
governments. So if we've seenthis model already, it's not a
good sign for America. So thisbill was put on the floor and
it didn't pass. And so theybrought it back with a lower
(26:52):
threshold of votes. And thegood news was actually that the
more people learned about thisbill, the more they were like,
oh wait, this is a problem. Butit oh , had actually gotten
quite a lot of bipartisansupport earlier in the Congress
because people, I mean, listen,I'm a former health staffer, so
I have a lot of sympathy andempathy for their lives. You
don't often have a time to readeverything. You will look at
(27:14):
like the congressional researchservice top line or a really
quick summary page, and thenyou give your boss a
recommendation of what to vote.
So when things are packaged as,oh , this is important to fight
terrorism and this would revokestatus for people who are
supporting terrorists, ofcourse that sounds great. So
this is absolutely, as you say,Jenny , a clarion call that,
you know, the , the civicsociety , uh, organizations and
(27:35):
nonprofits need to be reallyactive to make sure that
everybody on the hill when thebefore they have votes like
this, understand what they'reactually voting on and flag for
people ahead of time. Becausenot only are we gonna have to
educate foreign policy stafferson tax bills or anything like
that, but it's also sometimesthings get introduced and then
(27:57):
they like lay fallow for awhile and then they like are
shoved in to become amendments.
And again, that's the way thatstuff gets made. I actually
have helped former bosses ofmine pass really important good
work in a conference procedure,you know, after it wasn't an
amendment that was approved onthe floor or , you know, really
complicated procedural thingsthat most members and their
(28:18):
staff aren't tracking becausethere's so many things going on
at once. So it is reallyincumbent on us not only as
people who work in the sector,but as citizens who follow
these issues to be flaggingthese things when we see them .
So it's gonna be, again,anti-terrorism tax bills. It's
going to be transparency forpeople who receive usaid ,
(28:39):
which again is laudable andimportant, but not if it
actually puts their personallives in at risk. So this is
definitely a reminder foreverybody listening that like,
even if you don't think this issomething you work on now, this
is something you work on now.
And you know, we found that alot of our supporters who first
and foremost are, aresupporting us because they know
(29:00):
that we do important work andget funds to grassroot human
rights organizations in, youknow, X country . They
responded really, reallyquickly when they heard about
this bill and you know, this isusing this bill as an example
because they understood theimpact that it would have for
people like our partners, butalso the impact it would have
on us as Americans. You know, alot of things are changing and
(29:23):
I know that is really, reallyhard for Americans to
understand because I too am anAmerican who it is hard to
understand that like we don'tlive anymore in the America of
20 years ago, even 10 yearsago. We are living in a
different kind of America thatwill require all citizens to be
more engaged because again,there are no guardrails.
(29:46):
They're just people. It's likethe people are the only thing
standing between us andwhatever the on the other side
of it is .
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Are there any other ways that you are keeping an
eye out on what we areexpecting around human rights
and ways that we're gonna seehuman rights attacked under
this new administration orreturning administration
Speaker 2 (30:07):
the once in
future? Um , yeah , so, you
know, I think we're watching alot of us nominations
processes, but you know, whichis even scarer than the
nominations process or thepolitical appointments that
don't require Senateconfirmation, right? Those
people get to just come in and,you know, even though you can
say, oh , well Marco Rubio is anormie republican who has
(30:31):
experienced in foreign policyand actually like can find the
map the country's on a map likeabsolutely a hundred percent he
can. And a hundred percent he'san , you know, normie
Republican, but hundreds ofpeople that will be brought in
to work for him are not. Andyou know, that is absolutely
something that we are arewatching. They are people who
have been vetted through theproject 2025 project through
(30:54):
their loyalty and and ideology.
And they are MAGA loyalists.
They're probably MAGA loyalistsbefore they're American
loyalists. And, and that's aconcern when I went to work at
the State Department, I , uh,had to pledge a loyalty oath to
the Constitution. And so ifthese folks come in and they
also have to pledge of loyaltyoath to the president, that is
(31:15):
a really bad , uh, and BI thinktells you a lot of where their
priorities are going to be. Sothat is something we're gonna
be watching. I know that forthe average American, it's hard
to follow policies that aregonna be promulgated out of
agencies by a lot of thesepolitical appointees that don't
have senate , uh, confirmation.
So in, in that respect, I'd sayalso it's really important that
(31:36):
the civic society organizationsyou support are robustly
supported to do that. Uh ,where we can work together with
each other, which is anotherthing that I think is going to
be a really wonderful silverlining. I'm throwing my hands
up and trying to find the word,right, that like,
things are gonna be bad, but weare really all gonna work
together in a way I think thateven we didn't eight years ago,
(31:59):
because this isn't like hashtagresistance time. It's like, I'm
not even gonna say hashtags, Idon't say that usually, but it
is really gonna be confrontingattempts at authoritarian
efforts at at at government,right? So this isn't like, oh,
trump's a fascist because I ,that doesn't mean anything to
most Americans and you know, itdoesn't mean anything probably
(32:22):
anyway because people definethese things differently. But
you cannot dispute that theactions he has already taken
and already says he wants totake and project 2025 says he's
going to take, and the peoplewho work for him are gonna take
, are authoritarian in nature,which means collecting power
together and getting rid ofdissenting voices and
(32:44):
concentrating a power in onepart of government, right? And
America has always reallyprided itself on having a
separation of powers. And sowe're already seeing that
minimize itself. And so I dothink that like civil society,
and that does include mecertainly, but hundreds of
organizations and thousands ofpeople who are gonna come
(33:05):
together to confront whetherthey're re regulations with
like regular old fashionedadvocacy in Washington, whether
it means lawsuits that they canjoin to, to , uh, go against
things. Whether it means reallygetting regular citizens
excited and engaged to advocateto their congress people on
things. It's going to be acrossthe whole board and it is a
(33:28):
marathon, not a sprint. And soI, I think that we really have
to keep our eye on thedifferent pieces of it and
probably divide and conquer.
Like there's no way that we'reall gonna be able to do all the
things. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:39):
Uh , this is something I have been really
trying to one internalize , um,and two, make sure to keep in
mind as I'm just thinking aboutwhat we're gonna do next year
and making sure to talk aboutmm-hmm . On the
podcast is that you can't doall the things, you just can't,
you have to take care ofyourself. A lot of this like
(34:01):
authoritarian rule is to tryand overwhelm you mm-hmm
. So you feellike you can't do anything and
make you give up. So with allof that in mind, like what can
the audience do? Like how canthey get involved in these
efforts?
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Yeah. Um, I'm gonna start again , uh, talking about
our partners because they areso impressive and to be honest,
I'm starting to feel more andmore in a similar
position to them, right? In aplace that Americans never
thought that they would be. Sowhat they do whenever they're
campaigning and doing somethingand they fail, they sort of
gather, reassess, and beginagain. And, you know, I I think
(34:41):
not giving up and not becomingcomplacent is something that is
really hard to do. So I thinkfirst and foremost we need to
keep that in mind. I know thata lot of people are talking
about this in differentcontexts, but I think another
thing that is very important isnot to ever accept it as normal
and not to comply in advance.
And I'm saying this as someonewho, you know, just like even
(35:02):
in the news the last few days,you're just seeing so many
people comply in advance in away that is deeply unnecessary
and deeply unhelpful. So Ithink those are two like really
important signposts ormilestones or to keep in mind.
And then another thing that isfrustrating and we have to
(35:22):
develop is that forum policy ingeneral doesn't really have a
built-in constituency in theUnited States. And you know,
governments love that, I think,right? 'cause they don't have
to worry about that piece asmuch. And so when you actually
reach out to government people,even at the local level, right?
Your local, obviously locallevel folks don't have control
(35:44):
over it, but like you're alocal congress person's office,
it is incredibly powerful thenfor them to hear from you
because they're not used tohearing from constituents about
global human rights, about anyforeign policy, but certainly
global human rights. And wehave found that that like it is
incredibly powerful even insmaller numbers to reach out on
that. But going back to thelocal part , I mean, I think
(36:06):
also, and Jenny , I know youshare this very strongly as
well, is that like there's notas much divide anymore, right?
That the , the , the globalassault on trans folks we're
seeing here at home, the globalassault on abortion rights is
already being seen at home. Theglobal assault on basic civil
(36:26):
and political rights is nowbeing seen at home. So I think
if we start to think ofourselves as part of like the
global to local, which I knowused to be like a positive
thing and now is obviously likea kind of a negative thing is
we should be expressing that athome too. And so like fighting
for these rights in your localcommunity is not unrelated to
fighting for those rights thatour partners do in Senegal,
(36:50):
right? So I I I think that justnot staying quiet and being
ready to act when you can atany level of government that
you feel like you can is goingto be important. Now, I mean,
AWS has some specific plansthat we wanna be doing and we
wanna be in spaces, but I, Ialso think that we're
understanding that a lot of thetraditional forms of government
(37:13):
advocacy that we have usedforever and that like I have
used and no matter what jobI've had are not, it's gonna be
a much narrower path to that.
So I think that also folks thatwork in, you know , us advocacy
are going to need to do somemore outside of government
advocacy, whether it's withother actors or also just like
(37:33):
narrative change and reallyholding the media to account as
well.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
Yeah. And I, this really makes me think, you
know, so often , uh, maybe it'sjust 'cause I work in this
field, like abortion comes upoften in conversations , uh,
with people. You know, whenyour friends are talking about
whatever the new attack onabortion or accessing abortion
is mm-hmm . Likeyou can have just like a simple
(37:59):
conversation and talk about howit's not only here, the US is
also exporting these policiesmm-hmm. And talk
about why they need to careabout the US exporting human
rights violations, right? Likepreventing people from
accessing care and like whythey should also care about the
global stakes in thisconversation. A
Speaker 2 (38:20):
Hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
Okay. Rory, thank you so much for being here. It
was wonderful to talk to youall about human rights today.
Thanks for taking the time.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Thanks so much for having me and I'm glad it's a
good reminder to everyone thatwe should all be talking about
human rights all the time.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
Thanks so much, Jenny .
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Okay y'all, I hope you enjoyed my conversation
with Rory. It was so great toget to talk to her all about
human rights. And just areminder, we're not gonna be
around for the next two weeks,so I will see y'all in the new
year. If you have anyquestions, comments, or topics
you would like us to cover,always feel free to shoot me an
email. You can reach me atjenny jn n
(39:03):
ie@reprofightback.com or youcan find us on social media.
We're at re pros, fight back onFacebook and Twitter or re pros
FB on Instagram. If you loveour podcast and wanna make sure
more people find it, take thetime to rate and review us on
your favorite podcast platform.
Or if you wanna make sure tosupport the podcast, you can
also donate on our website atre pros fight back.com . Thanks
(39:25):
all.
Welcome to Repro Fight Back a podcast on all
things related to sexual andreproductive health rights and
justice. Hi, re pros. How'severybody doing? I'm your host
Jenny Wetter , and my pronounsare she her. So y'all, can you
believe this week marks sevenyears of this podcast? I cannot
(00:24):
believe that I have beenhosting this podcast for that
long. Honestly, if you hadasked me
our launch party seven yearsago, if I would still be doing
this, I would've not believedthat seven years later we would
still be going strong. I amfeeling so lucky to have one.
Such a wonderful audience.
Thank you all. I feel lucky tohave such amazing conversations
(00:47):
with so many wonderful guests.
Like I've talked to so manyamazing people over the seven
years of the podcast, that itall feels kind of unreal. I am
so grateful for the amazingteam that we have at re pros,
Rachel and Elena . They doamazing work for the podcast,
which is generally behind thescenes, so you don't see it,
(01:08):
but Rachel is in charge ofmaking sure that you get
wonderful show notes andkeeping the website up to date
, and she does so much otherstuff. Um , most importantly,
this week Rachel released anamazing new brief that she
wrote on the Helms Amendmentand it's harms. So definitely
check that out. I'll make surethat Rachel includes a link to
(01:30):
her brief in the show notesbecause y'all, you should read
it. It is a wonderful productand I am just, congratulations,
Rachel. You did a great job. Um, and Elena , who does our
social media, they just do anoutstanding job with our social
media presence. I'm so gratefulfor all of the work that both
of them do. They really keepthe Reaper's initiative going
(01:54):
strong, making sure that thepodcast gets out there. Oh,
Elena also does the transcriptsto make sure that y'all can
enjoy the podcast in whateverform you would like. So I, we
would not be what we are nowwithout Rachel and Elena . And
also just super grateful to Megwho does our editing, so that I
sound like I know what I'mtalking about and sound my
(02:16):
best. So thank you, Meg. Iappreciate all of the work that
you have done helping launchand doing editing for the
podcast for seven years. Imean, and Rachel has been with
me for the entire seven yearstoo. So like, this is amazing.
I'm just so grateful to thePopulation Institute for all of
their support and Kathleen forher support as our executive
(02:40):
director for the podcast. And ,um, you know, especially to my
old boss, Bob, who pushed meinto doing the podcast, I could
not imagine that it would bejust the absolute favorite part
of my job when , uh, when hehad asked me to do it. And I
very firmly was not interested
(03:00):
thankful that he pushed me toget me to do it, because I've
had such a wonderful timehaving so many amazing
conversations with suchwonderful guests. And if you
have been with me for sevenyears or if today is your first
episode, thank you so much. Um,I am so grateful to each and
every one of you and , uh, ifyou enjoy the podcast, I hope
(03:23):
you will share it with yourfriends. Write and review us on
whatever platform you arelistening to it on or enjoying
it on. Thank you. If you wantto support our podcast more,
you can make a donation toRepro Fight Back. We still have
wonderful fun giveaways fordonations. So if you donate
$25, you get these amazingstickers designed by Liberal
(03:47):
Jane that talk about , uh,let's see. We have ones that
say Support repro podcasts withmy cats on them. We have
reproductive rights, our humanrights we have slash the
patriarchy ones. We have , uh,fund abortion, fight Evil.
They're all very fun and youshould definitely , uh, donate
to get some. Also, if you wannadonate at $50, we have amazing
(04:12):
bags that you'll get inaddition to the stickers that
are really fun. They're like,have like a comic book speech
bubble on them and say,abortion is a human right, not
a dirty word, and are bright ,uh, hot pink and purple logo
colors. So very fun. If so, ifyou wanna support us for $25,
(04:32):
you get the stickers for 50,you get the stickers in the
bag. So I hope you can supportus. Let's see. Oh, the next
thing. I feel like there's somuch housekeeping in this
episode, sorry about that. Butreally important, we are gonna
take the next two weeks off.
Repro comes out on ChristmasEve and New Year's Eve this
(04:53):
year, so we just decided thatwe would take it off and we'll
see you all next year. It's areally good chance for us to
just step away and take sometime off and just relax and get
all prepared for everything weare going to be dealing with
next year. So we will be gonefor the next two weeks, but we
will see everybody next year.
(05:17):
Okay, y'all, that was so much,and I think we'll just go to
this week's episode. Sorry thatthe up top was basically all
housekeeping, but I am veryexcited for this week's
episode. We are talking to RoryKramer at the American Jewish
World Service about humanrights. It seemed like, you
know, we talk about humanrights a lot on the podcast and
(05:39):
how the issues we care aboutand work on our human rights,
but maybe it was time to take astep back and just talk about
what are human rights and totalk about the ways they're
going to be under attack duringthe next administration. So
with that, let's turn to myinterview with Rory. Hi Rory.
(05:59):
Thank you so much for beinghere today.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Thanks so much, Jenny . So excited to be here
with you.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
I am very excited to talk to you today, one, because
you're amazing, but two, we aregonna talk about human rights,
which is something we like,talk about a lot on the podcast
and that like, reaper rightsare human rights, trans rights
are human rights. But we don'tnecessarily get down to the
like nitty gritty of like, whatdo we mean when we talk about
human rights? But the reallyimportant thing is, before I do
(06:27):
that, maybe we should have youintroduce yourself. Sometimes I
get so excited to have theconversation. I start before I
do the important part, wouldyou like to introduce yourself
and include your pronouns?
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Absolutely. I'm Rory Kramer. I use she her pronouns
, uh, and I'm the director ofUS advocacy in American Jewish
World Service.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Okay. Now that we got the like work part out of
the way, let's have theconversation. I am really
excited, like I said, to talkabout human rights. Do you
maybe wanna tell us a littlebit of like big picture? Like
what, what are we talking aboutwhen we say human rights?
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Absolutely. So, you know, human rights are born out
of the belief that everyindividual is equal and
deserving of life, dignity,respect, freedom , uh, and then
human rights takes thosebeliefs and identifies what is
needed for human flourishingand places those obligations on
states to deliver them wheneverthose rights start right to
life, right to politicalparticipation, right, to a fair
(07:24):
trial. And you know, I thinkfor those of us that work in
these areas, whether they besectoral or broader human
rights, we all know, but worthrepeating that, you know, these
were all codified after WorldWar II by the international
community. And in fact, goodtiming, Jenny , that this is
actually the 76th anniversaryof the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights being ratified andadopted at the un. And it's
(07:47):
also kind of sad since the
when they are more under athreat than ever, really. And
another kind of sad part aboutit is that the US was an early
champion of these values,right? A leader among all the
nations and getting themadopted and in deploying the
resources to communities aroundthe world facing poverty and
(08:07):
persecution. And I think it'ssomething to keep in mind
before we get even more intothe nitty gritty, is that when
these rights were established,they were enumerated applying
to all human beings equally,regardless of origin, status,
race, religion, nationality,gender. And they were also
really focused on beingindivisible. You know, the ,
(08:29):
the declaration pointedlydeclined to elevate certain
rights above others because theauthors were well , uh, too
aware of that . This opened thepath to selective
interpretations of theseprinciples. And, you know, some
of the most fundamental textsthat the international
community relies on since thenhave elaborated on this theme.
So in the United Nations 1993Vienna Declaration, it stated
(08:51):
explicitly that all humanrights were universal,
indivisible, interdependent,and interrelated. And I think
it's so important to keep theinterrelated part in mind. Not
only because obviously theforces that are looking to take
away our basic human rights arealways trying to segment us
out, but really because of the,the way the work that HWS does
is so interrelated and I thinkso much of the partners that we
(09:15):
work with. So if I could take amoment now to take a step back
and talk about the work we doto sort of set up the, you
know, so I can really expressthe how impressive the work our
partners are and how it helpsreally educate us here in the
United States. So we're a grantmaking and advocacy
organization that is dedicatedto champion human rights around
the world. Wonderful lawlaudable goal that I'm sure a
(09:37):
lot of other organizationshold. But we do this in a
really sort of unique way. Sowe fund more than 500 social
change and human rightsorganizations in Africa, Asia,
Latin American, the Caribbean,in the areas of sexual health
and rights, civil and politicalrights, land, water , climate
justice. And then on certainoccasions, disaster
(09:58):
humanitarian relief. And we dothis by also accompanying those
grantees with our local staffwho share the knowledge , uh,
and the social movements on theground, and bringing those
grantees together and emboldenthose movements. And then
finally where I come into thepicture is that we advocate ,
uh, in Washington and sometimesinternationally to shift those
(10:19):
laws and policies to promotehuman rights work and
strengthen those grassrootsefforts in their countries
because of the outsized rolethe United States plays. And
that really is predicating allof our US work, right? That no
matter what the US is reallyholding outsized role, whether
for good or for bad, to makethe enabling environment for
our partners even easier. So,you know, we are now in a
(10:42):
position where I think for thefirst time, the United States
citizens can kind of see thework that our partners are are
doing. So to get back to theirwork, you know, in the
countries where we work, thecriminalization of human rights
is never an issue areacriminalization that we think
of it in dc I , you know ,authoritarian governments seek
(11:03):
to criminalize the exercise ofdemocracy, the, the defense of
rule of law or civic space. Andthey don't specify often on
particular rights of the peoplethey're fighting for. Sometimes
there's obviously individualhideous laws, right? Like
what's going on in Uganda nowwith the Anti Homosexuality
Act. But ultimately it is aconstriction of that civic
(11:23):
space and of the exercise ofpeople's basic dignity in human
rights. And so the challengingof the government abuse to
violate those rights is reallywhat those governments perceive
as the threat, regardless ofthe rights that they're
fighting for. So we see sooften across our issue areas
and across our geographiccoverage, that those movements
(11:46):
are working together to defendthose rights. So for example,
in a country like Nicaraguademanding sexual and
reproductive health and rightsof the communities they support
and the communities are equallyaffected by their violations of
the civil and political rightsbecause the entire country is
living under a dictatorialsystem that desires its
citizens its rights. Similarly,in El Salvador where abortion
(12:07):
is entirely illegal, includingtherapeutic abortion, feminist
groups are threatened andharassed by the state because
that is how the authoritariansrespond to the challenging of
their power. So not to pivottoo , too much to the United
States right off the bat, butyou know, we see we were
already starting to see that,that these authoritarians are
feeling emboldened by theelection of Trump. And then in
(12:31):
turn, some of the Republicanefforts in Congress already
that are seeking to shrinkcivic space to mirror some of
the efforts of some of theseauthoritarian , uh, governments
already, I think I've beensaying since the election, you
know, hugging dictatorsanywhere is good for dictators
everywhere. So it's thisvicious circle and loop of the
(12:55):
more we're emboldening anydictators, all dictators
everywhere are like coming tothe party and excited to be
able to sort of share bestpractices. Well,
Speaker 1 (13:04):
That obviously leads me to think about like some of
the things that happened in thefirst Trump administration
where there was like, not justactions they took that impacted
people's human rights, but likean actual attack on the human
rights framework itself. Um ,with things like the
Unalienable Rights Commissionand the even consensus
(13:26):
declaration, which trademark ,uh, Rachel Moynihan was neither
in Geneva, nor was it aconsensus document
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Discuss amongst yourselves . Yeah,
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Exactly. Um, so I are , are we thinking we're
gonna face some of these samelike actual attacks on the way
human rights are talked about?
Like versus like just, justversus like direct attacks on
the exercise of rights. Doesthat make sense?
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Why choose Jenny ?
Why choose? I
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Mean both are gonna happen.
start with the like big picturethen. You know,
Speaker 2 (14:00):
I think for your listeners that are familiar
with both the Geneva Consensusand the commission unalienable
rights, I'd say first off,sorry. Yeah. Um, and second
off. Yeah, I think those arejust the starting points,
right? They're going to pickthese things up and, and start
from there. I actually was abit more familiar with the
commission unalienable rights.
Uh, sadly for me, I attendedevery public meeting , um,
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Sorry,
Speaker 2 (14:21):
It was un it was unpleasant personally, but
also, you know, from a humanrights perspective, it was a
mockery of human rights , uh,having, I believe at the time
no members that had actuallybeen part parcel pre the
practice of human rights. And,you know, certainly a mockery
of government commissions thatat purport to actually care
about advancing policy and whatit also did pretty, pretty
(14:44):
clearly and, and was reallyreactionary specifically on an
abuse of religious freedom,right? Trump's folks did and
certainly will continue in thisadministration to sort of
confuse the freedom to worship,which is a human right and
grossly confuse it with thestate license to advance their
own particular brand ofreligious expression. And we
saw this really, really clearlywith the commission where they
(15:06):
came out with that the, themost important at the top of
the pinnacle are propertyrights, which when you talk
about property rights andAmerica's founding documents,
there's also a lot of likecreepy racism tied in there,
but also religious freedom.
And, but they didn't meanreligious freedom for you and
me, Jenny , and they certainlydidn't mean religious freedom
for anyone besides their veryspecific sort of white
(15:29):
Christian nationalism form,which is, you know, frankly
un-American, even though thatwas certainly what the founders
had at the time. But when youlook at the, the advancement of
the United States and of ourfounding documents, they have
progressed to be in the 21stcentury. And that is absolutely
not, and to be honest, we'regonna evoke founding fathers.
(15:49):
And I know that he is notimmune from critique, but
Thomas Jefferson actually wentout of his way at the time to
make sure there was no stateestablished religion. That's
actually one of the things hewas most proud of. So it was
really laughable when MikePompeo and his goons were like,
oh, no, no, no, we're gonnaignore that part, but we're
gonna like embrace the cyberpart .
(16:12):
that was a little bit ofeditorial there.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
I mean, again, it goes back to what you were
talking about at the beginning,which is like these rights are
indivisible, like mm-hmm
there's not a hierarchy likethat the US was trying to
create then.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
Absolutely. And you know, certainly it's very
difficult to look at somethingthat is about the unalienable
commission on human rights andthen also not talk about
anything that's happened in the20th, the 21st century around
human rights was laughable, notto steal any of Rachel
Moynihan's thunder, but I alsothink that this was not a
commission because it believedthat they were in violation of
several US regulations aroundcommissions. It was not really
(16:48):
grounded in human rights. And Ido believe that the Declaration
of Independence talked about aninalienable Right. Not an
unalienable . Right. So thatalways really annoyed me as
well. But you know, that'sneither
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Talk about me typing it all the time. And I always
was trying to do it
Speaker 2 (17:03):
The wrong way.
Absolutely. So, you know, likethat's just an , I think we
should just rename it asanother, you know. No thanks
Mike Pompeo
listeners are also probablyvery familiar with what a lot
of the actors that were behindboth of these things have been
doing the last four years, andit's not been , um, doing other
productive things. It's beentrying to advance these two
really faulty and offensiveregimes abroad where they could
(17:26):
in countries that also do notreally have democracy or are
authoritarian curious andmoving forward with it there.
And really, and we , ourpartners have actually seen
some very us fingerprints,let's just put it that way, on
a lot of the work they weredoing in trying to protect
their own human rights, whetherthey be SHR or otherwise in
(17:47):
their own countries. And soit's, you know, it's very, very
disheartening to know, not onlyhas that work been continuing
unabated abroad, but now the USbully pulpit, which obviously
just is not perfect and comeswith lots of strings attached,
but there has been in the pasta US bully pulpit where they
have the US government speakingout on behalf of those
(18:08):
marginalized communities, evenif the actions have not been
there. But at least speakingout , uh, and now the , the
bully puppet will be used fullyto, to take away their rights.
So I, I think that we'll seeattacks formulated and grounded
in religious freedom, which areobviously to take away other
people's human rights. As youcan imagine, many of our
supporters , uh, American Jewsaround the country and clergy
(18:31):
are grossly offended by thisand wanna mobilize on this.
They wanted to mobilize on itfour years ago, and I can't
imagine that they're going tofeel that this speaks on behalf
of them. And I imagine millionsof other Americans will feel
like this does not speak onbehalf of them .
Speaker 1 (18:45):
Yeah. Thinking of like the work that has been
done in the last four years,and like I'm sure polishing
their work, bringing othercountries on board or working
to get them to come on boardwhen the documents open up
again or, or coming intopractice again, like worried to
see those people coming backmm-hmm
Speaker 2 (19:05):
great jobs ahead of them , realfancy jobs. And I think that as
you brought up, like individualefforts legislatively or big
picture or internationally orregulatory in the executive
branch, I , I think we see allof those, and not only because
they have the ability to, butbecause that's part of the plan
(19:26):
is to overwhelm to everythingbe whack-a-mole. And it is, it
is tiring. You know, I thinkwe've already seen with some
bills that were on the flooralmost as test cases in the
last few months, but we willabsolutely see in Congress
moving forward are these billsaround the closing of civic
space. So that is, you know,anti-terrorism, pro
transparency, all the thingsthat are good and wonderful and
(19:49):
we all support, but the proofis in the pudding or the
devil's in the details orwhatever, whatever euphemism
you wanna use are absolutelygonna be true here because
there is no benefit foranybody, whether it's abroad or
at home with having a closedcivic space with the control of
a authoritarian government. Youknow, the , the fewer civil
(20:10):
society organizations there areanywhere is bad. And using a
government arm around taxes oraround funding as the, I guess
the, the stick with very littlecarrot is not diplomacy. It is
just authoritarian curious. AndI think a lot of Trump's allies
(20:31):
have seen this work abroad. Ourpartners certainly have seen
this work against them abroad.
Uh, and so we're very concernedabout those pieces of
legislation. And in particulararound transparency pieces. The
, uh, government already hasnames and addresses of people
that are subcontractees, but tomake those things public for
public transparency, I'm usingair quotes here, it could
(20:53):
actually be a kill list forpartners that we have partners
around the world where theirnames and their addresses would
be incredibly personallydangerous to them because they
are criminalized and theactivities they do in their
countries. You know, I thinkfor this, you see certainly
that SRHR groups at home andabroad, but certainly now more
at home than we've ever seenbefore, are going to be the
(21:15):
canary in the coal mine. But asI mentioned earlier, they are
in partnership and should be inpartnership with democracy
activists everywhere. So assoon as you see one of these
groups start to be attacked, weshould all take heart that
everybody's human rights areabout to be abused. And, you
know, I I I think thatsticking, I guess still to the,
(21:38):
the legislative andcongressional piece of this
'cause that sometimes is alittle bit more public than the
regulatory things that they'regonna do in the executive
branch is that, you know,bipartisan, I hate saying this,
but bipartisanship for the mostpart could be a mirage. You
know, we don't want the resultof this election to be, okay,
well we should do more workwith Trump because that's what
(22:01):
the American people wanted.
Without a careful eye that, youknow, just something being
bipartisan is not good . A goodin and of itself, this is
absolutely not your father'sRepublican party. There are not
a lot of efforts that I haveseen, and I have worked in
Washington for a quarter ofcentury
like a lot saying it that way,in and out of government in the
(22:23):
, on the hill, in the executivebranch, certainly in the
nonprofit and an advocacycommunity. And this is not
where we were 25 years ago.
This is not where we were 15years ago. And there are not a
lot of good faith effort actorswho want to do something that
is bipartisan for its sake. SoI am imploring so many of our
allies on, on the Hill to lookat something with a very keen
(22:45):
and watchful eye and not dosomething just because it is
bipartisan. And I think these,these Trojan horse transparency
and anti anti-terrorism billsare a great example. Like there
are times that you're just notgonna be able to do a
bipartisan thing on thisbecause the thing itself that
they're asking you to do isundemocratic. And I mean that
(23:06):
in the lowercase d democratic
comport with the rule of law.
And it does not comport with anAmerican tradition of
democracy. You know, and Ithink it's really important for
all of us, both in and out ofgovernment, and that it also
includes just regular citizensto remember that there are
really no guardrails. Likeguardrails are people, it is
just people. And this isreally, really important for
(23:30):
you to remember that you needto bring a clear eye and
vigilance to sort of all ofyour reasoning behind , whether
it's legislation, policydeterminations, personnel
decisions that theadministration's gonna be
making, that we are the onesthat are here to protect us.
There is, there is nothingelse.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
I think this is such an important conversation and I
think maybe we wanna take likea quick little , uh, second
that we're familiar with, butmaybe the audience isn't super
familiar with. And talk just alittle bit about the
anti-terrorism bill piece'cause mm-hmm
While it's something that wehave been talking about and
concerned about, I think ithasn't necessarily broken out
(24:08):
in the same way and just , um,do like a really quick, like
3000 foot level of like, what,what was in this bill that we
were so worried about.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Absolutely. Um, can I take an extra step back just
to make it big picture around,of course , this was a , a tax
bill, which as somebody whospent my career in US foreign
policy and also, you know,human rights, I was like, tax
what? You know, I think thatit's important to remember that
they , it's the same issues andthey're just gonna find a lot
of different buckets to putthem in. And so that's why I
(24:38):
feel like a lot of needing
Speaker 1 (24:39):
To have eyes everywhere, needing
Speaker 2 (24:41):
To have eyes everywhere. I am lucky, one of
my good friends is a tax policyexpert in Washington, but like,
gosh, if this moves to likeLabor standard , I don't know
any labor people. So like we'reall so segmented in Washington.
It's, it's , it could bedangerous, but, so, you know, I
think a lot of us, and probablya lot of your former guests
have been calling these billsTrojan horse bills , which I
actually think is not even fairbecause my kids love the ID and
(25:04):
the Odyssey and like, you know,well , well obviously the
Trojans are the good guysanyway, but whatever, it only
even makes me sad for that andthis because these are things
that on their face seem fine.
And so this bill in particularthat I was referring to is a
bill that would revoke the taxexempt status of any
organization in the US thatuses its money to support
(25:27):
terrorism. Who is against that?
No one is against that.
Everyone supports that. Butfirst of all, and probably most
important, that's alreadyillegal. So like what kind of
problem are we solving for? Arewe solving for an actual
problem, Jenny ? No, we are notsolving for an actual problem.
We are solving for anauthoritarian curious problem,
which is to close civic space.
(25:48):
Because in the current statusto become a a terrorist group
and a terrorist supportinggroup, there has to be actual
evidence in the rule of law anda very deliberate and slow
bureaucratic process, right? Sothe process that everyone
bemoans, all bureaucracy isactually here a protection and
part of the rule of law. So notonly does it exist, but there's
(26:09):
already a process that peoplecan go back and look at and
it's public. This bill wouldpurport to do it all with like
secret evidence and likeevidence that the Secretary of
Treasury that would control alot of this wouldn't
necessarily need to share. Soregardless of who the president
is and who the Secretary ofTreasury is, it's a dangerous
precedent and one that ourpartners have seen in their
(26:32):
countries. And I should restatethat we only operate in
countries and by we say AWSonly operates in countries that
have a problem with democracyor already authoritarian
governments. So if we've seenthis model already, it's not a
good sign for America. So thisbill was put on the floor and
it didn't pass. And so theybrought it back with a lower
(26:52):
threshold of votes. And thegood news was actually that the
more people learned about thisbill, the more they were like,
oh wait, this is a problem. Butit oh , had actually gotten
quite a lot of bipartisansupport earlier in the Congress
because people, I mean, listen,I'm a former health staffer, so
I have a lot of sympathy andempathy for their lives. You
don't often have a time to readeverything. You will look at
(27:14):
like the congressional researchservice top line or a really
quick summary page, and thenyou give your boss a
recommendation of what to vote.
So when things are packaged as,oh , this is important to fight
terrorism and this would revokestatus for people who are
supporting terrorists, ofcourse that sounds great. So
this is absolutely, as you say,Jenny , a clarion call that,
you know, the , the civicsociety , uh, organizations and
(27:35):
nonprofits need to be reallyactive to make sure that
everybody on the hill when thebefore they have votes like
this, understand what they'reactually voting on and flag for
people ahead of time. Becausenot only are we gonna have to
educate foreign policy stafferson tax bills or anything like
that, but it's also sometimesthings get introduced and then
(27:57):
they like lay fallow for awhile and then they like are
shoved in to become amendments.
And again, that's the way thatstuff gets made. I actually
have helped former bosses ofmine pass really important good
work in a conference procedure,you know, after it wasn't an
amendment that was approved onthe floor or , you know, really
complicated procedural thingsthat most members and their
(28:18):
staff aren't tracking becausethere's so many things going on
at once. So it is reallyincumbent on us not only as
people who work in the sector,but as citizens who follow
these issues to be flaggingthese things when we see them .
So it's gonna be, again,anti-terrorism tax bills. It's
going to be transparency forpeople who receive usaid ,
(28:39):
which again is laudable andimportant, but not if it
actually puts their personallives in at risk. So this is
definitely a reminder foreverybody listening that like,
even if you don't think this issomething you work on now, this
is something you work on now.
And you know, we found that alot of our supporters who first
and foremost are, aresupporting us because they know
(29:00):
that we do important work andget funds to grassroot human
rights organizations in, youknow, X country . They
responded really, reallyquickly when they heard about
this bill and you know, this isusing this bill as an example
because they understood theimpact that it would have for
people like our partners, butalso the impact it would have
on us as Americans. You know, alot of things are changing and
(29:23):
I know that is really, reallyhard for Americans to
understand because I too am anAmerican who it is hard to
understand that like we don'tlive anymore in the America of
20 years ago, even 10 yearsago. We are living in a
different kind of America thatwill require all citizens to be
more engaged because again,there are no guardrails.
(29:46):
They're just people. It's likethe people are the only thing
standing between us andwhatever the on the other side
of it is .
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Are there any other ways that you are keeping an
eye out on what we areexpecting around human rights
and ways that we're gonna seehuman rights attacked under
this new administration orreturning administration
Speaker 2 (30:07):
know, I think we're watching alot of us nominations
processes, but you know, whichis even scarer than the
nominations process or thepolitical appointments that
don't require Senateconfirmation, right? Those
people get to just come in and,you know, even though you can
say, oh , well Marco Rubio is anormie republican who has
(30:31):
experienced in foreign policyand actually like can find the
map the country's on a map likeabsolutely a hundred percent he
can. And a hundred percent he'san , you know, normie
Republican, but hundreds ofpeople that will be brought in
to work for him are not. Andyou know, that is absolutely
something that we are arewatching. They are people who
have been vetted through theproject 2025 project through
(30:54):
their loyalty and and ideology.
And they are MAGA loyalists.
They're probably MAGA loyalistsbefore they're American
loyalists. And, and that's aconcern when I went to work at
the State Department, I , uh,had to pledge a loyalty oath to
the Constitution. And so ifthese folks come in and they
also have to pledge of loyaltyoath to the president, that is
(31:15):
a really bad , uh, and BI thinktells you a lot of where their
priorities are going to be. Sothat is something we're gonna
be watching. I know that forthe average American, it's hard
to follow policies that aregonna be promulgated out of
agencies by a lot of thesepolitical appointees that don't
have senate , uh, confirmation.
So in, in that respect, I'd sayalso it's really important that
(31:36):
the civic society organizationsyou support are robustly
supported to do that. Uh ,where we can work together with
each other, which is anotherthing that I think is going to
be a really wonderful silverlining. I'm throwing my hands
up and trying to find the word,right, that like,
things are gonna be bad, but weare really all gonna work
together in a way I think thateven we didn't eight years ago,
(31:59):
because this isn't like hashtagresistance time. It's like, I'm
not even gonna say hashtags, Idon't say that usually, but it
is really gonna be confrontingattempts at authoritarian
efforts at at at government,right? So this isn't like, oh,
trump's a fascist because I ,that doesn't mean anything to
most Americans and you know, itdoesn't mean anything probably
(32:22):
anyway because people definethese things differently. But
you cannot dispute that theactions he has already taken
and already says he wants totake and project 2025 says he's
going to take, and the peoplewho work for him are gonna take
, are authoritarian in nature,which means collecting power
together and getting rid ofdissenting voices and
(32:44):
concentrating a power in onepart of government, right? And
America has always reallyprided itself on having a
separation of powers. And sowe're already seeing that
minimize itself. And so I dothink that like civil society,
and that does include mecertainly, but hundreds of
organizations and thousands ofpeople who are gonna come
(33:05):
together to confront whetherthey're re regulations with
like regular old fashionedadvocacy in Washington, whether
it means lawsuits that they canjoin to, to , uh, go against
things. Whether it means reallygetting regular citizens
excited and engaged to advocateto their congress people on
things. It's going to be acrossthe whole board and it is a
(33:28):
marathon, not a sprint. And soI, I think that we really have
to keep our eye on thedifferent pieces of it and
probably divide and conquer.
Like there's no way that we'reall gonna be able to do all the
things. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:39):
Uh , this is something I have been really
trying to one internalize , um,and two, make sure to keep in
mind as I'm just thinking aboutwhat we're gonna do next year
and making sure to talk aboutmm-hmm
podcast is that you can't doall the things, you just can't,
you have to take care ofyourself. A lot of this like
(34:01):
authoritarian rule is to tryand overwhelm you mm-hmm
make you give up. So with allof that in mind, like what can
the audience do? Like how canthey get involved in these
efforts?
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Yeah. Um, I'm gonna start again , uh, talking about
our partners because they areso impressive and to be honest,
I'm starting to feel more andmore
position to them, right? In aplace that Americans never
thought that they would be. Sowhat they do whenever they're
campaigning and doing somethingand they fail, they sort of
gather, reassess, and beginagain. And, you know, I I think
(34:41):
not giving up and not becomingcomplacent is something that is
really hard to do. So I thinkfirst and foremost we need to
keep that in mind. I know thata lot of people are talking
about this in differentcontexts, but I think another
thing that is very important isnot to ever accept it as normal
and not to comply in advance.
And I'm saying this as someonewho, you know, just like even
(35:02):
in the news the last few days,you're just seeing so many
people comply in advance in away that is deeply unnecessary
and deeply unhelpful. So Ithink those are two like really
important signposts ormilestones or to keep in mind.
And then another thing that isfrustrating and we have to
(35:22):
develop is that forum policy ingeneral doesn't really have a
built-in constituency in theUnited States. And you know,
governments love that, I think,right? 'cause they don't have
to worry about that piece asmuch. And so when you actually
reach out to government people,even at the local level, right?
Your local, obviously locallevel folks don't have control
(35:44):
over it, but like you're alocal congress person's office,
it is incredibly powerful thenfor them to hear from you
because they're not used tohearing from constituents about
global human rights, about anyforeign policy, but certainly
global human rights. And wehave found that that like it is
incredibly powerful even insmaller numbers to reach out on
that. But going back to thelocal part , I mean, I think
(36:06):
also, and Jenny , I know youshare this very strongly as
well, is that like there's notas much divide anymore, right?
That the , the , the globalassault on trans folks we're
seeing here at home, the globalassault on abortion rights is
already being seen at home. Theglobal assault on basic civil
(36:26):
and political rights is nowbeing seen at home. So I think
if we start to think ofourselves as part of like the
global to local, which I knowused to be like a positive
thing and now is obviously likea kind of a negative thing is
we should be expressing that athome too. And so like fighting
for these rights in your localcommunity is not unrelated to
fighting for those rights thatour partners do in Senegal,
(36:50):
right? So I I I think that justnot staying quiet and being
ready to act when you can atany level of government that
you feel like you can is goingto be important. Now, I mean,
AWS has some specific plansthat we wanna be doing and we
wanna be in spaces, but I, Ialso think that we're
understanding that a lot of thetraditional forms of government
(37:13):
advocacy that we have usedforever and that like I have
used and no matter what jobI've had are not, it's gonna be
a much narrower path to that.
So I think that also folks thatwork in, you know , us advocacy
are going to need to do somemore outside of government
advocacy, whether it's withother actors or also just like
(37:33):
narrative change and reallyholding the media to account as
well.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
Yeah. And I, this really makes me think, you
know, so often , uh, maybe it'sjust 'cause I work in this
field, like abortion comes upoften in conversations , uh,
with people. You know, whenyour friends are talking about
whatever the new attack onabortion or accessing abortion
is mm-hmm
(37:59):
conversation and talk about howit's not only here, the US is
also exporting these policiesmm-hmm
about why they need to careabout the US exporting human
rights violations, right? Likepreventing people from
accessing care and like whythey should also care about the
global stakes in thisconversation. A
Speaker 2 (38:20):
Hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
Okay. Rory, thank you so much for being here. It
was wonderful to talk to youall about human rights today.
Thanks for taking the time.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Thanks so much for having me and I'm glad it's a
good reminder to everyone thatwe should all be talking about
human rights all the time.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
Thanks so much, Jenny .
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Okay y'all, I hope you enjoyed my conversation
with Rory. It was so great toget to talk to her all about
human rights. And just areminder, we're not gonna be
around for the next two weeks,so I will see y'all in the new
year. If you have anyquestions, comments, or topics
you would like us to cover,always feel free to shoot me an
email. You can reach me atjenny jn n
(39:03):
ie@reprofightback.com or youcan find us on social media.
We're at re pros, fight back onFacebook and Twitter or re pros
FB on Instagram. If you loveour podcast and wanna make sure
more people find it, take thetime to rate and review us on
your favorite podcast platform.
Or if you wanna make sure tosupport the podcast, you can
also donate on our website atre pros fight back.com . Thanks
(39:25):
all.
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