United States Plunges into Unlawful Rule and Extrajudicial Killings

Renee Good and Alex Pretti were murdered by federal agents because they were human rights defenders, bearing witness to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) widescale human rights abuses in Minneapolis. As legal observers and protestors, they were scrutinizing and calling attention to an authority that has attempted every measure to evade accountability for its crimes of unlawful kidnapping and deportation.

In light of these and other extrajudicial killings, and as government officials now label civil society solidarity “domestic terrorism,” FIDH and the Center for Constitutional Rights warn of a potentially irrevocable backsliding of human rights and the rule of law in the United States.

The systemic suppression of investigations and evidence, coupled with outright lies and denial of facts, as well as the direct pressure placed on judges mark dramatic escalations of authoritarian tactics by government officials and place serious constraints on the possibility of justice for those whose rights are being violated.

The Trump administration’s efforts to provide unchecked funding and to increase the power of federal law enforcement agencies in the United States increasingly resemble attempts to establish instruments for state-sanctioned intimidation and extrajudicial killing. "The kidnapping and detention of protesters, union leaders, Native community leaders, and many more appear as nothing but direct counterinsurgent measures and a sign of a rapid erosion of civil society’s freedoms,” said Alexis Deswaef, FIDH’s president.

And in the absence of public obedience with such tactics, signs of a permanent state of exception, boosted by unprecedented surveillance, are also taking hold. Popular pressure, protests, and civil society’s mobilization now appear as the sole safeguard for democracy and human rights in the United States. FIDH and the Center for Constitutional Rights commend those taking to the streets and those refusing to back down in this moment of crisis. As organizations from an international network, they are well-aware of the risks human rights defenders take under authoritarian regimes, but also are certain that history is on the side of the protesters refusing injustice.