The Trump administration is expected to announce the United States’ withdrawal from the United Nations Human Rights Council on Tuesday, Bloomberg reports.
The council was created in 2006 to replace the U.N. Human Rights Commission, which was criticized for including members with poor human rights records.
Officials in the Trump administration have been critical of the council for some time for what they see as its “pathological campaign” against Israel. “For our part, the United States will not sit quietly while this body, supposedly dedicated to human rights, continues to damage the cause of human rights?” Nikki Haley, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., said before the council last year. “In the end, no speech and no structural reforms will save the members of the Human Rights Council from themselves.”
On Monday, the U.N.’s high commissioner for human rights railed against the administration’s policy of separating parents and children who cross the border illegally, calling it “unconscionable.”
Haley and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are expected to make the announcement today at 5 p.m. Eastern.
