By: Danielle Han

Featuring: Jessica Stern and Dr. Geeta Rao Gupta

Read in: Jezebel

On Monday, dozens of member-states gathered at the United Nations headquarters in New York for the start of the 70th session of the Commission on the Status of Women to vote on the CSW’s annual “agreed conclusions,” a document that, since 1996, outlines the year’s most pressing priorities and objectives for women’s rights. But can you guess which country was the only one to vote “no” on the newest guidelines?? Go on, you probably only need one try.

Yep, it was the United States.

The U.S. kicked off the two-week gathering by being the only country to vote “no,” with 37 countries voting “yes,” and the Ivory Coast, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Mali, Mauritania, and Saudi Arabia abstaining. What’s more, the U.S. also tried to force its own anti-DEI, anti-women, anti-trans agenda into the document.

Some of the agreed conclusions this year included enshrining “justice mechanisms” for sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights; addressing gender-based violence and crimes; and collecting evidence on sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights. According to the U.N.:

This year’s Conclusions pertains to the theme of this seventieth session:  “Ensuring and strengthening access to justice for all women and girls, including by promoting inclusive and equitable legal systems, eliminating discriminatory laws, policies and practices, and addressing structural barriers”.

In her opening remarks, CSW Chair Maritza Chan Valverde (Costa Rica) emphasized that “no country has full legal equality—and women globally still hold only two-thirds of the legal rights that men enjoy.”

The U.S., however, proposed eight alternative amendments to the document, including one that “defined” men and women—or, in other words, that reflected the president’s executive order seeking to erase trans people and target DEI initiatives. A U.S. representative also said that because the agreed-upon conclusions included “ambiguous language promoting gender ideology,” such language can be considered as protecting abortion rights (God forbid).

Delegates rejected all of the U.S. amendments, which led Valverde to call for a vote on the conclusions for the first time. “We are convinced that the text represents the most balanced outcome achievable at this stage,” she said.

Speaking to reporters afterwards, Health and Human Services’ Director of Global Affairs Bethany Kozma—who once called abortion “murder”—called the document a “disappointment.” While Kozma was not the official representative for the U.S., she traveled to New York for the vote. She’s previously served as the senior advisor for the Office of Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment at USAID—though she left that post for HHS in March. On Monday, she said the conclusions also had a lack of “motherhood or unique female experiences,” and that it “failed to define what a woman is.” (It’s really not that hard, Bethany.)

“It was the first time that the CSW Agreed Conclusions were brought to a vote but it was necessary because of the regressive amendments put forward by the U.S.—amendments that were voted down by the majority,” Geeta Rao Gupta, co-founder of Alliance for Diplomacy and Justice (ADJ) and co-founder of Arch Collaborative, told Jezebel. “As a result, the U.S. was the only country to vote against the final Agreed Conclusions. Through that vote the world demonstrated that the U.S. could be silenced!”

The U.S. representative added that it was exactly because the U.N. “recklessly” promoted gender ideology and abortion that the U.S. withdrew from women’s rights-related groups in January, including organizations dedicated to the advancement of family planning, maternal and child health, and preventing sexual violence in conflict. “How do we entrust the women and girls of the world to an agency that denies the biological realities of a women?” he said. As of November, the U.S. also started to consider abortion access a human rights violation.

“The U.S. sat on the sidelines of negotiations and then tried to take over at the finish line,” Jessica Stern, ADJ co-founder, told Jezebel. “The silver lining is that its anti-equality agenda failed spectacularly. This is only the beginning of its brazenness and our ability to fight back.”