U.S. becomes the first country ever to skip its U.N. human rights review twice, leaving an empty chair in Geneva

U.S. becomes the first country ever to skip its U.N. human rights review twice, leaving an empty chair in Geneva.

The United States on Tuesday became the first country to fully shun the United Nations' regular review of its human rights record, leaving an empty chair in Geneva for the second year in a row, according to reporting by NPR and by the Associated Press as published by CBS News. Reuters also reported that the decision drew censure.

Every one of the 193 U.N. member states is examined by its peers roughly every four to five years in a process called the universal periodic review. National delegations present their record, answer questions and hear recommendations from other governments. The U.S. review had been scheduled for November 2025; after Washington skipped it, the session was pushed back to this week in the hope the administration would reconsider.

The Trump administration withdrew from the Human Rights Council last year, accusing it of anti-U.S. and anti-Israel bias. In a statement to the AP, a State Department spokesperson said the administration gives "no credibility" to the body and called it an "irredeemable body" that "makes a mockery of human rights."

Leaving the 47-member council does not exempt a country from the review, which applies to every U.N. member, NPR noted. Only Israel has skipped a session before, in 2013, and it returned nine months later. No country had ever failed to appear twice. The council says a review cannot go forward without representatives of the country in question.

Rights groups led by the American Civil Liberties Union traveled to Geneva to present evidence anyway. Jamil Dakwar, director of the ACLU's human rights program, told reporters the council "should hold the United States accountable," citing the treatment of immigrants, student protesters and LGBTQ people. Member states had prepared questions for U.S. diplomats on the death penalty and abortion restrictions, according to NPR.

Eric Tistounet, the council's first secretary and now a visiting professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute, warned that the absence of the world's leading power could damage the credibility of the whole review system. U.N. officials are worried that holding a review without the U.S. could encourage other governments to stay away as well. For now, the U.N. has postponed any decision on how to respond until early next year.