Saturated in lies and conspiracy theories, incited by the President, and protected by white privilege, the mob that stormed the seat of the US government demonstrated to the world the resurgent fascist threat we face.\u00a0 The path to this moment is long, running from the origins of our country in indigenous genocide and chattel slavery, through xenophobia and nationalism, all the way to the digital echo chamber of lies, division and hatred on social media platforms.\u00a0 The path away from this moment will be equally long, but must begin with a renewed commitment to human rights and the rule of law.<\/p>\n
The Human Rights Institute and Dodd Human Rights Impact are committed to democracy and the rule of law, and condemn this spectacle of violence and the creeping fascism and authoritarianism such violence manifests.\u00a0 We take seriously President Katsouleas\u2019s admonition on Wednesday that higher education be an engine \u201cfor democracy throughout the world,\u201d and are dedicated to building a culture of human rights through engaged research, teaching, and outreach.\u00a0 Ultimately, it is through the protection of the equal and inherent dignity of all members of the human family and the progressive realization of social justice that protect against the allure of demagogues and would-be dictators.<\/p>\n
Whenever Donald Trump leaves office\u2014today, tomorrow, or January 20th<\/sup>\u2014the work to strengthen democracy and build a culture of human rights will continue.\u00a0 As we have for the last four years and more, The HRI and Dodd Impact will work in solidarity with our partners on and off campus to foster the knowledge, values, and skills necessary for democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.\u00a0 Together with you, we look forward to working to advance these values and practices of democracy, human rights and social justice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Wednesday\u2019s rampage at the Capitol\u2014resulting in the deaths of Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick and four others\u2014was among the darkest day of this dark season for the United States.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":164,"featured_media":182099,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2318,88,2312],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2380],"class_list":["post-182098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dodd-impact","category-global-affairs","category-hri"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-12 14:27:53","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/164"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182098"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":182100,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182098\/revisions\/182100"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/182099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182098"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=182098"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=182098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}