Even as his surrogates and supporters claim President Donald Trump is “the most pro-gay president in American history,” Trump’s own Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo is scheduled to lead an event concerning human rights during the United Nations General Assembly, which starts on September 15. The event will also revolve around a report from the Commission on Unalienable Rights, founded by Pompeo in 2019.
The commission itself has come under scrutiny with critics claiming it is a sham created to undermine LGBTQ and reproductive rights. The woman leading the commission, Harvard Law School Professor Mary Ann Glendon, is a forthright opponent concerning abortion and same-sex marriage rights. Glendon wrote an article about same-sex marriage in 2004 for the Boston Herald in which she argued marriage should be defined as “between one man and one woman.”
LGBTQ advocacy group GLAAD also released a statement condemning that the majority of the Commission was compromised of individuals with anti-LGBTQ histories.
The report from the committee focuses largely on Religious Freedoms while stating some troubling views:
“In divisive social and political controversies in the United States — abortion, affirmative action, same-sex marriage — it is common for both sides to couch their claims in terms of basic rights.”
Groups such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Human Rights First have sent emails to foreign diplomats in an attempt to persuade them to denounce the report as well as not approving of Pompeo’s event at the UN.
According to an email procured by online news outlet, Mother Jones, sent to many diplomats of the European Union:
“We are aware that Secretary Pompeo plans to host a high-level meeting on the Commission during the opening week of this year’s UN General Assembly. We are therefore calling on you not to support this event to make clear to the US government and the public that you reject the Commission’s dangerous view of selective, nationalized human rights.”
The chair and secretary of the commission will additionally host an event with the United States ambassador to the UN presenting the report to the global community on September 16.
Sources: Washington Examiner, NBC News, Harvard Law Today, GLAAD, Commission on Unalienable Rights, Mother Jones,
