The foreign policy community is currently taking in the Trump administration’s capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and wondering whether its bluster on seizing Greenland will translate into anything concrete. Experts have noted that both seem to have emerged from its recently released National Security Strategy (NSS) and the self-styled “Donroe doctrine,” which asserts US hegemony over the Americas. Conspicuously lacking from the NSS, however, is any reference to international religious freedom (IRF) promotion.
The International Religious Freedom campaign
The IRF community—a loose network of activists, scholars and religious organizations advocating for greater official attention to religious freedom abuses—has been active on this issue since the late 1990s, sometimes working with the US government, other times criticizing it. The community came together as a bipartisan and multifaith efforts to advocate for and shepherd the 1999 International Religious Freedom Act through Congress. This act established an office of religious freedom in the State Department, led by an Ambassador-at-large, directing the State Department to monitor religious repression around the world and recommending states to be designated “countries of particular concern” (CPC). It also set up the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, a nongovernmental watchdog agency.
IRF advocates were often frustrated with official US dedication to religious freedom promotion, however. IRF advocates noted the lack of progress on limiting religious repression. Tom Farr—the first director of the State Department’s IRF office who later ran Georgetown University’s Berkeley Center and then the Religious Freedom Institute—argued US support for religious freedom is “mainly rhetorical,” lacking a clear strategy.
Specifically, the IRF community settled on three priorities: CPC designation, quick appointment of an IRF ambassador, and consistent release of the annual IRF reports. I remember numerous meetings in which advocates would bemoan the failure of the Obama administration to act on these priorities. The IRF reports were frequently delayed, and the administration seemed hesitant to act on religious freedom violations with CPC designations.
Religious freedom in the US national security strategies
Despite this frustration with tangible action on IRF, it has been incorporated into 21st century US foreign policies, specifically through various NSS.
Most NSS content encompasses what Peter Feaver describes as “the collection of plans and policies that comprise the state’s deliberate effort to harness political, military, diplomatic, and economic tools” to pursue a state’s “national interest.” Religious freedom, however, has been part of this discussion as well.
A powerful example is the 2002 US National Security Strategy. This document presented the George W. Bush administration’s sweeping vision for America’s place in the post-9/11 world. A major part of it was its connection between US national security and the promotion of human rights around the world. This included religious freedom. When discussing the need to defend human dignity, the NSS included “religious and ethnic tolerance” as part of this. It also pledged the United States would “take special efforts to promote freedom of religion and conscience and defend it from encroachment by repressive governments.”
In early 2017, during the first Trump administration, then-Vice President Mike Pence gave a speech stating that international religious freedom promotion would be a priority for the Trump administration. This was reflected in the 2017 NSS, which pointed to religious freedom as a key value of the United States and listed “protecting religious freedom and religious minorities” as a key priority. The Trump administration quickly appointed former Senator Sam Brownback as Ambassador-at-large while the State Department organized a Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom, which resulted in the Potomac Declaration, codifying steps the United States would take on IRF. Pence’s office also directed USAID to direct aid towards persecuted Christians.
What the 2025 National Security Strategy suggests about Trump’s IRF policy
The 2025 NSS, however, presents a stark contrast when it comes to IRF. The only mention of religious freedom was a slightly confusing statement that it would oppose “elite-driven, anti-democratic restrictions on core liberties in Europe, the Anglosphere, and the rest of the democratic world, especially among our allies.” Tellingly, it says nothing about defending persecuted Christians.
This is in line with the second Trump administration’s broader de-emphasis on human rights. Under Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the State Department cut many of its experts on human rights, which would affect its IRF monitoring and advocacy. The Trump administration has also directed the State Department to emphasize “national sovereignty” over human rights. Trump nominated pastor and former Congressman Mark Walker to be the Ambassador at large for IRF (although he has not yet been confirmed). Unlike previous ambassadors, Walker’s only religious freedom-related work was his demand that the House chaplain have children, effectively excluding Roman Catholics.
To be fair, Trump has taken some steps relating to IRF. Specifically, he has spoken out on systematic violence against Nigerian Christians, and designated it a CPC. He also launched air strikes against purported Islamic State sites in Nigeria, intended to protect that country’s Christians.
What this suggests for IRF advocacy
The absence of IRF in the 2025 NSS should be a warning sign for IRF advocates.
In Trump’s first term, IRF advocates could make a valid case for working with the Trump administration, even as some of Trump-45’s policies were directly contradictory to the values of the IRF community. For example, Trump implemented a travel ban that targeted majority-Muslim countries, tried to deport Christians to countries where they would be persecuted, included anti-Muslim activists on his staff, and was silent on Russia’s persecution of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Yet, IRF advocates could claim these lamentable actions did not negate the concrete steps Trump had taken on their policy priorities. Moreover, based on my private conversations with several IRF advocates, they recognized the issues with Trump on religious freedom, but argued the institutional access they had gained would allow them to address these problems.
Trump’s NSS should demonstrate these hopes have been quashed. It not only fails to emphasize IRF; it lays out a set of priorities for the United State that are in direct contrast to IRF promotion. And the Trump administration has undermined its earlier IRF initiatives in other ways, such as its cuts to foreign aid, which are harming Middle Eastern religious minorities. Even the strikes on Nigeria do not represent a serious commitment to IRF, as it is difficult to say what they accomplished and they were not followed up by sustained engagement to help Christians in that country.
Whither IRF advocacy?
This leads to the important question: what should the IRF community do now? One could argue that continued connections to the Trump administration allow for some influence, and official attention to crises like Nigeria’s provide a foundation for sustained IRF engagement. This, however, should sound familiar, as it is what IRF advocates argued in the first Trump administration. And as we are now seeing, it did not work.
I would argue it is time for the IRF community to adopt a prophetic model of engagement with Trump. The community would stop trying to work with the Trump administration and instead call out its lack of concern for IRF. This is based on the Biblical concept that trusting in immoral leaders rather than God will undermine your own cause.
I recognize some may not wish to go that far. I also recognize that this may come off as a bit entitled, failing to recognize that compromise is necessary in any political endeavor.
A more moderate approach, which has been simmering among IRF advocates for some time, would be reformulating the metrics through which progress is measured. Chris Seiple, a longtime IRF advocate, wrote on the distinction between “advocates” and “builders” in the IRF community. Advocates call attention to religious freedom abuses and develop the metrics for success. Builders, by contrast, engage with government officials and religious communities to build trust and lay the foundation for religious freedom. While Seiple called for cooperation between the two, re-focusing IRF advocacy on religious engagement may both be more effective—as I have previously argued—and resolve the political tensions involved in cooperating with US administrations.
A “builders”-focused IRF campaign would not rely on either/or institutional steps like quickly appointing an effective IRF ambassador. Instead, it would require long and gradual processes of engagement with both US and foreign policymakers. As a result, the IRF community would not be well-served by attacking policymakers due to the ongoing nature of the “building” process. At the same time, this approach requires a robust diplomatic and humanitarian effort by the US government, so it would be difficult to mollify advocates with discrete institutional steps.
The IRF community thus has options. But maintaining the status quo—focusing on institutional access above all else—cannot be one of them.
