The Trump administration has retreated from a core aspect of U.S. diplomacy, dramatically reducing its support for democracy and human rights worldwide. On July 11, 2025, the federal government made final staffing cuts to over 1,300 employees of the U.S Department of State, dealing another blow to the Department’s ability to implement what remains of foreign assistance programming effectively.
As was indicated in the Congressional Notification sent by the State Department in May on its reorganization plans, key bureaus focused on democracy, human rights, and labor, and on population, refugees, and migration have been decimated–with significant staff dismissals–and their roles severely weakened and refocused under the new structure. The proposed budget sent by the Trump administration to Congress for foreign assistance in fiscal year 2026 also eliminates any meaningful focus on supporting human rights, democracy, and press freedom globally.
As members of Congress work on legislation to reauthorize and reorganize the State Department, and determine the foreign assistance priorities for fiscal year 2026, they have the opportunity to ensure that the promotion and protection of democracy, human rights, and fundamental freedoms are maintained as “fundamental components” of U.S. foreign policy as Congress itself established by law.
What funding for human rights and democracy is at stake?
Congress has consistently expressed bipartisan support for human rights and democracy programming in foreign assistance. For fiscal year 2024, Congress appropriated $2.9 billion for democracy assistance programs managed by USAID and the Department of State; with the FY 2025 continuing resolution meaning a similar amount (notwithstanding the $83 million cut to the Democracy Fund that is part of the recission package). This funding was for “programs that support good governance, credible and competitive elections, freedom of expression, association, assembly, and religion, human rights, labor rights, independent media, and the rule of law, and that otherwise strengthen the capacity of democratic political parties, governments, nongovernmental organizations and institutions, and citizens to support the development of democratic states and institutions that are responsive and accountable to citizens.” These funds included an estimated $345.2 million appropriated for the State Department’s Democracy Fund for fiscal years 2024 and 2025, which has been administered by the Bureau for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL).
The proposal for funding for the State Department for fiscal year 2026 eliminates the Democracy Fund, citing the justification of streamlining accounts as part of the review and reform of U.S. foreign assistance. There is no explicit mention of human rights programming in the State Department’s Congressional Budget Justification (CBJ).
In detailing “key foreign assistance account consolidations, pauses, and eliminations,” the CBJ requests $2.9 billion for a newly created America First Opportunity Fund (AFOF), focusing on initiatives that directly benefit U.S. interests. However, the amount requested pales in comparison to the over $8.3 billion in estimated funding levels for FY2025 from the eliminated accounts, including the Democracy Fund and the Economic Support Fund, which also supported democracy promotion and human rights programming. Furthermore, there is no guarantee that the AFOF will include any support for democracy and human rights, underscoring the need for Congress to explicitly appropriate funds for this purpose.
What happens to human rights and democracy work within the State Department?
DRL’s role in programming
With the end of USAID – just 250 USAID staffers are being incorporated into the State Department – DRL is the main body within the State Department able to implement programming to support human rights and democracy globally. Under the restructuring, DRL, with approximately 80 percent fewer staff, will be under the direction of a newly created Under Secretary for Foreign Assistance and Humanitarian Affairs, as the Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Human Rights and Democracy was eliminated. As Congress debates and determines a reauthorization bill, it should guarantee adequate staffing so that DRL can provide the oversight and management necessary to ensure U.S. taxpayer dollars are appropriately allocated and spent.
U.S. support for civil society organizations and activists working to promote human rights, democracy, and press freedom has been crucial. For Latin America alone, WOLA has documented how civil society organizations and independent journalists have already been forced to reduce staff or shut down completely as a result of U.S. funding cuts earlier this year, including activists and journalists from repressive countries like Nicaragua, Cuba, and Venezuela, many operating in exile. These organizations are essential in documenting and holding their governments accountable for human rights violations, corruption, and other abuses, as well as supporting civic engagement, including through independent election monitoring. They also inform the United States’ human rights reporting and various sanctions authorities related to human rights and corruption.
Countering authoritarian regimes and restoring democracy in countries such as Venezuela and Nicaragua will also depend on having a robust and independent civil society as part of any transition process. Past U.S. funding, including through DRL, has further served as a lifeline for human rights defenders, journalists, and other activists at risk, providing them with immediate emergency and security assistance in their home countries or enabling them to relocate abroad.
Reduced funding, coupled with a diminished capacity to issue grants to support these courageous individuals and organizations, will undermine U.S. efforts to back those working against dictatorships and to prevent the further closure of civic space in Latin America and globally. Repressive governments, from Russia to Nicaragua, Venezuela, and El Salvador, all celebrated USAID’s demise precisely due to the support given to organizations defending and promoting human rights and democracy in these countries.
DRL’s regional offices
As a human rights organization focused on U.S. foreign policy, WOLA has extensive experience raising challenging and uncomfortable human rights concerns in discussions about bilateral relations, security cooperation, border security, migration, and other areas. DRL had played this role in U.S. diplomacy. Secretary Rubio has stated that human rights diplomacy will not disappear; instead, it will be integrated into the regional country desks and embassies. However, as former DRL staff have noted, officers at the State Department’s country desks or in embassies often “accommodate the views of those governments, which generally resent criticism of their human rights records…The overriding imperative for those regional country desks and embassies is to smooth relations with those governments and militaries, and human rights concerns are often seen simply as bilateral irritants.”
For human rights defenders, journalists, and social leaders at risk, U.S. engagement on human rights can be a lifeline; more broadly, the U.S. government’s ability to have these difficult conversations, albeit inconsistently, has indicated the importance of human rights and democracy in U.S. foreign policy.
Guaranteeing in a reauthorization bill that DRL has regional staff, given their specialization and engagement with civil society organizations, will ensure that there are U.S. officials with the background and knowledge to promote a rights-based U.S. approach to foreign policy, informed diplomacy, and accurate reporting on the human rights situation globally.
DRL’s Office of Security and Human Rights (SHR)
The Trump administration’s restructuring has eliminated DRL’s Office of Security and Human Rights (SHR), reassigning some of its functions elsewhere. The SHR office had carved out an important role in ensuring at least some human rights focus in foreign security assistance and licensing of arms transfers, overseeing programs’ impacts on democracy and civil-military relations, and supporting transitions from conflict to peace.
Congress should keep the current functions of this small but vital office. In particular, it should avoid any reduction or alteration to a critical statutorily required function that SHR currently plays: vetting tens of thousands of potential aid recipients and units each year for Leahy Law compliance (Sec. 620M of the Foreign Assistance Act). This function offers immeasurable value to U.S. foreign policy by avoiding the humanitarian harm and severe loss of credibility that would result from U.S. support to people and units that have committed gross human rights violations with impunity in their countries.
Why should human rights and democracy promotion remain central points in U.S. foreign policy?
When people think about economic or development aid, they often envision programs that aim to keep populations healthy, pull them out of poverty, or provide essential services, apart from crisis relief. Activities such as developing water supply and sanitation systems, delivering life-saving medicine and services, and providing microcredit are important. But the lack of resources and opportunities that make those programs necessary has stubborn causes, too. Unaccountable corruption drains funds and renders governments inoperable. Weak justice systems do not enforce the rules that a prosperous modern economy requires. Weak rule of law and security sectors foment gangs, organized crime, illicit economies, and environmental destruction.
It is in the U.S. interest to help address those causes so that foreign assistance advances sustainable economies as well as safer communities and stronger and more accountable government institutions. To be truly effective, assistance should incorporate the kind of programming that DRL has a proven capacity to administer, a need more acute with the dismantling of USAID. This cannot be done with the dramatic cut in size and restructuring of the State Department currently being implemented.
Funding for civil society organizations working to hold their governments accountable and support for press freedom, independent journalism, and democratic participation is rarely popular with the recipient nations’ ruling elites. Still, this assistance plays a crucial role in resisting democratic backsliding and defending human rights globally, and it has been an important diplomatic tool in U.S. foreign policy for over five decades which should be preserved.
