THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2025 15 Administration officials defended the restructuring as a bid to “increase readability” and remove “redundancies.” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce insisted that no country is “singled out for condemnation or praise.” Critics, however, see the cuts as deliberate politicization. “It sends a signal that there’s going to be a free pass [on human rights issues] from the United States government, that it will look the other way if a government is willing to cut deals or do the bidding of this administration,” said Uzra Zeya, head of Human Rights First and a former FSO and senior State Department official. Freedom House warned that the omissions “deal a heavy blow to U.S. leadership on human rights, serve the interests of authoritarian powers, and leave policymakers and private-sector consumers with fewer resources to inform their work.” The consequences reach beyond Washington, D.C. Civil society organizations rely on the reports’ compilation of evidence from U.S. embassies worldwide, NGOs, and international monitors. The timing of the cuts also raises alarms. In 2024 voters in more than 60 countries went to the polls, and more than 100 elections are scheduled worldwide in 2025. Yet the 2024 reports exclude sections on election abuses and irregularities, just as authoritarian governments are working to erode international standards of democratic accountability. Labor Rights at a Crossroads On August 28, President Trump issued an executive order further excluding agencies and subdivisions from collective bargaining rights under Chapter 71 of Title 5, citing national security. The order removed protections for Civil Service employees in the U.S. Agency for Global Media (including VOA), the Bureau of Reclamation’s hydropower facilities, subdivisions of the Patent and Trademark Office and NOAA, the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration, as well as NASA. Union leaders warned that the action would weaken employee protections and reduce accountability. Days later, on September 15, employees and union members gathered outside NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C., to protest workforce reductions and the loss of union protections. AFSA is also at the center of this fight. On April 7, AFSA filed a suit in federal district court challenging a March 27 executive order that revoked bargaining rights for 97 percent of its bargaining unit members at State and USAID. A legal battle ensued; the case remains active and is central to protecting Foreign Service members’ workplace rights. Why Diplomats Matter Congress has a responsibility to ensure America continues to have the most capable diplomatic and development workforce in the world. And I recognize your commitment to working on an authorization and the hard work of both of our staffs. As Bill Burns, one of America’s finest Foreign Service officers wrote, and I quote: “Diplomats are translators of the world to Washington and Washington to the world.” They are early warning radars for threats and opportunities. Builders and repairers of relationships, policymakers, drivers and executors, protectors of our citizens abroad, promoters of America’s economic interests, interrogators of military intelligence and economic tools, organizers, conveners, negotiators, communicators, and strategists. That is why what we do here matters. Our work must enhance, not diminish, the ability of our diplomats to succeed that has always required clear eyes, real oversight, and a bipartisan process. —Representative Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) in a House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing titled “Markup of State Department Authorization Bills” on September 17. JOSH Heard on the Hill In May, Judge Paul L. Friedman granted AFSA’s request for a preliminary injunction, temporarily blocking the order as applied to the Foreign Service. Although a federal appeals court later paused that injunction, AFSA has pressed forward. In August, the union filed a motion for summary judgment, asking the court to rule on the merits of its case based on the current record. The government quickly responded with its own motions, asking the district court to hold the motion for summary judgment in abeyance and asking the court of appeals to overturn AFSA’s earlier win. Judge Friedman recently granted the government’s motion to hold the case in abeyance pending the outcome of the court of appeals’ ruling on the preliminary injunction. Whatever the outcome, the case remains active and central to protecting Foreign Service members’ workplace rights.
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