October 28, 2024

Bipartisan CNAS Task Force Calls for Renewed U.S. Commitment to Global Democracy

By: Richard Fontaine, and Gibbs McKinley

Washington, October 28, 2024 — Today, the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) released a report calling on Washington to reassert global leadership on democracy and human rights. The product of a high-profile, bipartisan task force of foreign policy experts, the paper urges the next U.S. administration to engage with the contest between freedom and authoritarianism.

“The stakes today are enormous,” said Richard Fontaine, chief executive officer of CNAS and one of the report’s lead authors. “For years now, democracy has declined globally, and human rights have come under new pressures. Acknowledging both our limitations and our domestic challenges, the United States should lead in supporting democratic values and human rights abroad.”

Leading the Free World: Reasserting U.S. Leadership on Democracy and Human Rights calls on U.S. policymakers to embrace a values-infused foreign policy agenda and recommends concrete steps by which Washington can do so. The report is authored by Richard Fontaine, Shanthi Kalathil, Tod Lindberg, Tom Malinowski, Sarah Margon, Gibbs McKinley, Derek Mitchell, Nicole Bibbins Sedaca, Corban Teague, and Daniel Twining.

The report recommends that policymakers and lawmakers:

  • Expose global human rights abuses
  • Counter corruption and hybrid threats
  • Employ Congress to enhance the visibility of dissidents and activists
  • Combat transnational repression
  • Protect individual privacy as a foundation of democratic societies
  • Partner with other democracies in pledging collective, nonmilitary responses to election interference by foreign states

The authors urge U.S. policymakers to seize the moment, recommit to a values-based foreign policy agenda, and combine their defense of U.S. democracy with an affirmative effort to support political freedom and human rights abroad. The time to act, they emphasize, is now.

For more information or to arrange an interview with the report authors, please contact Charles Horn at [email protected].

Securing U.S. Democracy Initiative

Leading the Free World

The United States has led the free world for eight decades, helping to usher in an era of unprecedented human flourishing. For much of that period, democracies expanded in num...

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Authors

  • Richard Fontaine

    Chief Executive Officer

    Richard Fontaine is the chief executive officer of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). He served as president of CNAS from 2012–19 and as senior fellow from 2009–12...

  • Gibbs McKinley

    Research Associate to the CEO

    Gibbs McKinley is the research associate to the CEO. Her work encompasses U.S. national security, the history of U.S. foreign policy, and global threats to democracy. McKinley...