Faith groups push back against State Department’s new Commission on Unalienable Rights

A coalition of 430 human rights, civil rights, foreign policy, and faith organizations, leaders, and scholars has submitted a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pom­peo urging him to dismantle his department’s new Commission on Un­alienable Rights.

Organized by Human Rights First, the letter’s signatories include 21 American religious leaders and dozens of faith-based organizations, including the Presbyterian Church (USA), American Jewish World Service, T’ruah, Re­constructing Judaism, the Anti-Defamation League, the National Council of Churches, Muslims for Pro­gressive Values, and Catholics for Choice, as well as secularist groups like American Atheists and the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

“We view with great misgiving a body established by the US government aimed expressly at circumscribing rights through an artificial sorting of those that are ‘unalienable’ and those to be now deemed ‘ad hoc,’” the letter reads. “These terms simply have no place in human rights discourse.”