On February 27, authorities in Thailand forcibly returned 40 Uyghurs to China. The United States didn’t want to see them sent back. Congressional offices had issued statements of concern in the weeks leading up to the deportation. Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested in his January confirmation hearing that a diplomatic resolution protecting the detainees would be a priority for his work with the Thais.
But on Thursday, after languishing in a Thai detention facility for more than a decade, the Uyghur men were forcibly returned to China. They now face likely torture and ill-treatment. Since 2014, Chinese authorities have perpetrated what the U.S. government under the first Trump administration determined amounts to genocide against the Uyghur people and other Turkic ethnic groups.
After 11 years of detention, the Uyghurs’ forced return was an unconscionable abdication of the Thai government’s obligations to uphold international and domestic law. It was also a demonstration of the degree to which the United States has forfeited its influence with allies. The incoherence of the Trump administration risks marginalizing the diplomatic strength necessary for Congress and the State Department to advocate effectively for human rights in U.S. foreign policy.
In the weeks leading up to the return, the fate of the Uyghurs generated bipartisan concern among government officials in the United States. On February 25, Senators Jim Risch and Jeanne Shaheen, chairman and ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, respectively, released a joint statement warning the Thai government not to send the men back. House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFAC) ranking member Gregory Meeks issued a statement of concern in January, when human rights groups raised concerns that the deportation might be imminent. Following the forced return, HFAC Chairman Brian Mast suggested the Thais had delivered the men to “concentration camps.”
At his confirmation hearing in January, Rubio had expressed confidence that his diplomatic efforts with the Thais would “achieve results” to protect the detainees. With their forced return, the Thai government delivered a blistering failure to Rubio, who has built his political identity in large part on hawkish, pro-human rights opposition to the government of China.
The secretary quickly condemned the forced return, but his condemnation exposed the political inconsistencies of the wider administration. Even as the Uyghurs were escorted onto a Xinjiang-bound plane leaving from Bangkok, staff from the U.S. Department of Defense were in Thailand to participate in the Cobra Gold military exercises, the largest joint and combined exercise in the Indo-Pacific region. On the day of return, the Thai and U.S. militaries were engaged in a “Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief Disaster Exercise” in a province east of the Thai capital.
Only 48 hours before the deportation, the U.S. extolled Cobra Gold as “a concrete example of the strong alliance and strategic relationship between Thailand and the United States” and expressed “gratitude to our friend and Ally” for hosting it.
Rubio’s statement came on day two of the joint exercises, which will continue, undeterred by the secretary’s “strongest possible” condemnation, until March 7. The Trump administration seems determined to maintain a security alliance with Thailand that is impervious to human rights concerns – even those expressed by its own officials. This internal incoherence telegraphs to other governments the fracturing of U.S. diplomatic strength.
The 40 men returned to China were part of a group of more than 300 Uyghurs who escaped from Xinjiang in 2014, most of whom were arrested trying to enter Malaysia from Thailand. More than 170 were resettled to Turkiye shortly after their arrests. In 2015, more than 100 were forcibly returned to China – a decision that provoked such international outrage that the Thai government opted to keep the remaining escapees in detention for over a decade, fearful of incurring another punishing round of rebukes and inflaming diplomatic tensions with allies such as the United States.
The decision to repatriate a large group of Uyghurs indicates that the Thai government is no longer concerned with U.S. rebukes or interested in stated U.S. human rights priorities.
That is in large part because the Trump administration is no longer demonstrating concern with its own purported human rights priorities. From the dismantling of USAID to the abandonment of Ukraine, White House policies have undermined and reversed U.S. government positions that were once bipartisan or Republican-led. Rubio’s ineffectiveness with the Thais, on an issue he has indicated was of significant concern to him, was driven in part by an administration that not only failed to support his authority but has sought actively to compromise it. President Donald Trump’s sidelining of the State Department damages the diplomatic power of the U.S. government and further elevates a White House platform narrowly preoccupied with economic or security interests.
Rubio apparently believed at some point that U.S. diplomatic strength could prevent the forced return of the Uyghurs from Thailand to China, where they now face extreme danger. Now he has a front row seat to witness the shattering of that strength.
There is little left between Trump and the dismantling of international alliances and credibility. But Rubio, a 20-year veteran of the U.S. Senate, could work with his colleagues in the legislative branch to assert the value of diplomacy. Congressional offices could hold oversight hearings, calling both White House and State Department witnesses, to ensure that the rule of law and human rights are protected. Without a response to the Trump administration’s incoherence, the State Department and Congress alike will be left with little capacity to advocate for human rights in U.S. foreign policy.