Despotic Without Censure
term in January amid uproar from opposition figures who accused him of rigging the vote, and despite calls for a new election from the Organization of American States. The American chargé d’affaires offered only tepid statements calling on all sides to behave peacefully.
And the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, who was once forced to surrender power for four years to respect his Constitution, has barred the main opposition challenger in the March election, virtually assuring that he will win a fourth term. Mr. Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire for closer ties with Mr. Putin.
Despite decades of lofty American talk of democracy and human rights, espoused by every president since Jimmy Carter, policies have prioritized security and strategic considerations over principle. And the C.I. A. torture program after the September 11, 2001, attacks further undermined America’s standing.
Experts say Mr. Trump’s embrace of hard- line leaders like President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, whose antidrug drive has killed thousands of his own citizens without due process, has only encouraged their worst excesses.
Stewart M. Patrick, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said in an email: “Trump’s lionizing of the ‘strong’ leadership qualities of authoritarian person- alities like Putin, Erdogan, Duterte, and Sisi — as well as his own attacks on free press at home — cannot help but to embolden their efforts to crack down on civil society and crush dissent in their own countries.”
Trump administration officials question the value of publicly lecturing friendly autocrats about their record, arguing that such criticisms are more effectively made in private.
Last year, Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson said that while American “values” like freedom and human dignity still underpinned American policies abroad, insisting that others adopt those values “creates obstacles” to advancing American interests.
Mr. Trump has not hesitated to use human rights as a cudgel against unfriendly countries, like Iran, North Korea and Venezuela. Critics say that by not confronting allies, Mr. Trump is ceding valuable leverage over strongmen, who, despite their worst actions, still care about their international image.
“Bad governments behave badly, no matter what,” said Tom Malinowski, who was assistant secretary of state for human rights in the Obama administration, a position that remains unfilled under Mr. Trump. “But they take the expected American reaction into account when making decisions.”
Citing the example of Egypt, Mr. Malinowski added: “If you’re going to send your security forces out to kill a bunch of Muslim Brotherhood leaders, knowing the U. S. is going to be in your face when it happens, and that it could have an impact on security cooperation, that’s a factor. It doesn’t mean you’ll do everything the Americans want. But it does probably mean that fewer people get killed.”
American rhetoric on human rights is seen as cynical in parts of the world where Washington has a history of selectively embracing despots. During the Cold War, the United States allied with Mobutu Sese Seko in Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo; the shah of Iran, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi; and General Augusto Pinochet of Chile. More recently, President Barack Obama was openly disdainful of Mr. Sisi’s harsh tactics yet left untouched America’s $1.3 billion in annual military aid to Egypt.
Even so, an American president’s rhetoric can make a difference.
“Yes, realpolitik often wins out over values, and it often seems steeped in hypocrisy,” said Michael Wahid Hanna of The Century Foundation in New York. But, he added, espousal of those values by American officials “is neither 100 percent cynical, nor is it inconsequential.”