WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md.), a senior member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, today issued the following statement upon the State Department’s release of the Human Rights Report, which highlighted a declining trend in human rights around the world and the global impact that the coronavirus pandemic had on rights practices.

“Secretary Blinken’s forceful presentation of the annual Human Rights Reports today at the State Department represents a welcome return to the America that speaks truth to the powerful around the world who are abusing the rights of their peoples. His reiteration of the centrality that the Biden-Harris administration is placing on human rights in foreign policy is refreshing to hear and important to build upon. I was pleased to hear him say that the administration is committed to ‘imposing consequences’ for violations of rights, and he specifically cited the leverage that we in the Congress have given the Executive in the Global Magnitsky Act that I authored.

“I also was pleased to learn that Secretary Blinken has directed the State Department to publish an addendum later this year to provide analysis of violations of the women’s rights, and particularly reproductive and sexual rights, that had been dropped from these report by the prior administration.”

###