The annual report by the NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) underscores that the year since Donald Trump returned to power in the United States has been marked by a «blatant disregard for human rights and egregious violations,» taking steps back in areas ranging from immigration and criminal justice to gender, the environment and freedom of speech.
As part of the president’s aggressive policy against immigration, the report highlights that, in order to detain undocumented immigrants, «hundreds of unnecessarily violent and abusive raids have been carried out” in the last year, such as those seen in recent days in Minneapolis, where two protesters were killed by federal agents.
His administration has also revoked guidelines that prohibited the detention of migrants in «sensitive locations» such as schools, hospitals, or places of worship.
HRW notes that the White House has used race and ethnicity to create scapegoats, limited asylum applications in violation of US and international law, attempted to eliminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for thousands of people, unjustly arrested US citizens, and summarily deported «an increasing number of Black and Brown immigrants, violating due process rights and fomenting fear.»
«Claiming a risk of ‘civilizational erasure’ in Europe and leaning on racist tropes to cast entire populations as unwelcome in the US, the Trump administration has embraced policies and rhetoric that align with white nationalist ideology,» writes HRW Executive Director Philippe Bolopion in the report’s foreword.
“Immigrants and asylum seekers have been subjected to inhumane conditions and degrading treatment; 32 died in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in 2025, and as of mid-January 2026, an additional 4 have died,” Bolopion adds.
‘A decided shift toward authoritarianism’
All of this, coupled with the deployment of the National Guard in various cities under pretexts to consolidate the power of the Federal Government, reprisals against alleged political enemies, and attempts to neutralize the US system of checks and balances, supports, according to the report, “a decided shift toward authoritarianism in the US.”
The document recalls that on the very first day of his second term, Trump ordered the elimination of all federal diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, “the first in a series of actions that eroded initiatives and institutions designed to combat racial and other forms of discrimination.”
Since then, the Republican administration has attempted to «aggressively sought to erase Black history,» and «downplay or obscure racial injustice» in the country.
The US, along with Japan, the only G7 country that retains the death penalty, executed 47 people in 2025, the study notes, which also points out that the country confines young people at a rate of «more than twice the global average.»
It also notes that children continue to be prosecuted as adults, especially for crimes considered serious, and that the US is the only country in the world that allows minors to be sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
Furthermore, it points out that in the first year of Trump’s second term, and three years after the Supreme Court overturned federal protections for abortion, legislation restricting women’s sexual and reproductive rights has continued to increase in several states, where the Republican administration has cut or eliminated funding for reproductive health and family planning programs.
Attacks against trans community, institutions
The Trump administration has intensified attacks against transgender communities and promoted and pushed through bans, now in effect in more than half of the country’s states (27), on providing gender-affirming healthcare to minors—measures that the Supreme Court upheld in June.
The fierce fight against renewable energy is compounded by the fact that the real estate mogul withdrew the country from the Paris Agreement and that the Environmental Protection Agency has proposed overturning the notion that greenhouse gases endanger health.
In foreign policy, HRW notes that the current US administration has decided, among other things, to expand sanctions against the International Criminal Court and attempt to undermine other institutions—from which it has withdrawn—that were created to defend fundamental rights, such as the UN Human Rights Council and the World Health Organization. It also points out that the US has cut off almost all foreign aid by dismantling its agency, USAID.
The report gives special mention to the military attacks in the Caribbean and the Pacific against what Washington claims are boats transporting drugs. These attacks have left more than 120 people dead and constitute extrajudicial executions flagrantly illegal under international law, the document states.