ACLU Updated Submission to the 2026 Universal Periodic Review

GENEVA – The United Nations Human Rights Council today called on the United States to resume its cooperation with the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), a mechanism that calls for each UN Member State to undergo a peer review of its human rights record every five years. In its decision, the Human Rights Council also announced that it would reschedule the UPR of the U.S. for 2026, while leaving open the possibility for it to be scheduled sooner. In August, the Trump administration announced that it would boycott the UPR, breaking longstanding participation in the UPR in an attempt to evade accountability for its human rights record. The UN Human Rights Council had given the U.S. government until Friday afternoon to appear in person before the council before issuing its decision. In response to the failure of the U.S. to appear and the adoption of the resolution on non-cooperation, civil society organizations and state and local officials, who are attending the UN meeting in Geneva this week, echoed the Human Rights Council’s calls on the Trump administration to resume its cooperation with the UPR. Statements from partners are as follows: “The Human Rights Council’s decision makes clear that the Trump administration cannot evade accountability,” said Jamil Dakwar, director of the Human Rights Program at the American Civil Liberties Union. “We condemn the Trump administration for undermining the UPR and setting a dangerous example that will further weaken universal human rights at home and abroad.” “The Trump administration is abandoning its obligations to human rights protections domestically and internationally,” said Robert Saleem Holbrook, executive director of the Abolitionist Law Center. “In yet another instance of the authoritarian path this administration is embarking on, the refusal to participate in the UPR’s international convening will only harm its own interests. The decision reflects a reckless act devoid of leadership and deserves to be condemned and rebuked in the strongest possible terms.” “The Trump administration's unprecedented decision not to participate in the UPR human rights review is shameful and reflective of the fact that they are either unwilling or unable to defend their abhorrent human rights record,” said Chandra Bhatnagar, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California. “From the discrimination and violence inflicted in the ICE raids, to the attacks on free speech of protesters and journalists, to the deployment of the national guard in American cities when no crisis exists, the world is watching the United States government attacking the constitutional and human rights of its own people. " Siya Hegde, Staff Attorney at the National Homelessness Law Center, remarked that “the Trump Administration’s failure to show up for its own review and pretend it is above the law has again made it clear that it does not care about basic human rights. To maintain any sense of legitimacy for the international human rights system that has provided protections for billions of people for the past 80 years, the UN Human Rights Council must call this out in the strongest possible terms. Without this international accountability, the risk of harms to people both in the U.S. and abroad, including to the millions of unhoused people in the U.S. who are being criminalized simply for not being able to afford the rent, will go up even more than it already has.” “This is unprecedented: the United States risks becoming the first country in the history of the UN’s Universal Periodic Review process to fully evade this important human rights-related review,” said Carolyn Nash, Advocacy Director with Amnesty International USA. “The Trump administration has doubled down on its disregard for international accountability and human rights at home and around the world. This failure to participate is a further abandonment of the U.S. government’s human rights commitments – it must not stand. The Trump administration can, and must, reverse course, submit its national report for the review, even belatedly, and attend its review in 2026.” “The international community must act now with the courage demonstrated by all sectors of civil society and people’s movements fighting back against the U.S. government’s cruelty and belligerence,” said Nadia Ben-Youssef, Advocacy Director for the Center for Constitutional Rights. “While successive U.S. administrations have enjoyed impunity for grave violations of human rights and thus eroded the international legal system, Trump’s latest moves are so egregious they threaten the possibility of a world order premised on values of equality, justice, and repair. We must resist with everything we have.”