On a stage set against the backdrop of the presidential palace in Guatemala City, a man delivered an exultant speech culminating with a plea: ‘God bless Guatemala’. It was a religious event, but the speaker was not your typical evangelical preacher: it was Guatemala’s president himself, Alejandro Giammattei.

It was 9 March, a special day – one the Guatemalan Congress had declared the ‘National day for life and family’ – and the conservative president was guest of honour at the public religious ceremony hosted alongside the Ibero-American Congress for Life and Family, organised by a Mexico-based Christian group in Guatemala’s capital. The city had just been declared ‘pro-life capital of Iberoamerica’.

In front of this select audience, President Giammattei stressed his country’s dedication to protecting ‘life from conception’, both by constitutional mandate and because ‘our faith commands it’. He also declared that ‘while other countries are dropping bombs, such as Russia attacking Ukraine, we are saying yes to life’. The president unveiled a new monument at the National Palace and renamed one of its areas ‘the courtyard of life’.

Close by, women’s groups staged a protest performance centred around a row of black coffins, an expression of mourning for the rights trampled on and lives lost as a result. They decried the penetration of anti-rights forces into the highest echelons of political power, as reflected not only in the president’s speech but also in the bold anti-rights move the National Congress made the previous day.

The dark side of 8 March

On the evening of 8 March, before the hustle and bustle of the mobilisation for International Women’s Day (IWD) died down, the Guatemalan Congress passed the ‘Law for the Protection of Life and the Family’, increasing penalties for abortion, banning same-sex marriage and restricting the ability of schools to teach about sexual diversity. Instead of going home, women’s groups who had just taken part in IWD events shifted gears and headed to Congress to protest.

The bill, originally submitted in 2017 by the conservative party Visión con Valores (Vision with Values), encapsulated the territory anti-rights groups are contesting: it simultaneously targeted women’s rights and LGBTQI+ rights, portrayed as the demands of ‘minority groups’ whose behaviours run counter to the ‘natural order’ and threaten the ‘moral balance’ of Guatemalan society.

Passed with an ample majority, the new law enshrined ‘the protection of the right to life, the family, freedom of conscience and expression, the institution of marriage between a man and a woman, in addition to the right of parents to guide their children in their sexuality’. It increased prison sentences for women having abortions to between five and 10 years and amended the Civil Code expressly to prohibit same-sex marriage.

The law was unanimously rejected by national and international human rights organisations and brought a strong street reaction by feminist and LGBTQI+ activists. President Giammattei was evidently stung by this backlash. Two days later, and just one day after standing proudly on his preacher’s podium, he announced via Twitter that ‘as a representative of national unity’, he had decided to veto the bill because ‘it violates the Political Constitution and international conventions to which Guatemala is a signatory party’. He later argued that the law had technical defects that might unintentionally enable the criminalisation of women who suffer miscarriages. Exactly one week after passing the law, legislators followed the president’s lead and voted to shelve it.

Anti-rights groups active in Guatemala

To get to this point, anti-rights groups had been patiently shifting public discourse and increasing their influence for years. At election time, presidential candidates had increasingly mobilised anti-rights sentiment for political advantage. In the 2019 presidential contest, most parties and candidates, including some that had previously expressed some support for LGBTQI+ people, embraced anti-rights discourse. In May 2019, 15 pairs of presidential and vice-presidential candidates signed a ‘Declaration on Life and Family’ drafted by an anti-rights organisation, in which they committed to block any progressive legislation on women’s and LGBTQI+ rights.

The president from 2016 to 2020, Jimmy Morales, was a conservative evangelical who was outspoken in his opposition to abortion rights and same-sex marriage and fuelled anti-rights hatred. The anti-rights bill was submitted during his term in office. In 2018, Congress rejected two progressive initiatives: one seeking to provide an effective response to minors who were victims of sexual violence and decriminalising abortion for rape victims under 14, and another on the recognition of gender identity. The rejection of the abortion bill was accompanied by a massive anti-rights rally.

President Giammattei pledged on the campaign trail to shut down the Presidential Secretariat for Women. Similar pledges are being made by winning candidates across the world, most recently in South Korea. Since gaining office, Giammattei has been loyal to his anti-rights promises. In July 2021 he presented his ‘Public Policy for the Protection of Life and the Institutionalisation of the Family’, enshrining the state’s supposed duty to protect ‘life from conception’.

Both the president and the congressional majority have closely engaged with anti-rights and fundamentalist religious organisations, as reflected in the legislative initiative that declared 9 March as the Day for Life and the Family and imposed an obligation on the three branches of government to hold commemorative events – a commitment that representatives of each gladly fulfilled on the public stage earlier this month, effectively doing away with any semblance of secularism and co-opting the public sphere.

A transnational threat

Guatemalan anti-rights groups are far from exceptional: they are part of a well organised and well-funded transnational movement that is making an impact throughout the Americas.

This can be seen in Ecuador and the USA. The day after Guatemala’s anti-rights law was shelved, Ecuador’s conservative president partly vetoed a bill legalising abortion in cases of rape that the National Assembly passed in February. President Guillermo Lasso, who has repeatedly positioned himself ‘in favour of life from conception’, called for the unification of time limits on abortion for all cases, in both urban and rural settings, and demanded the inclusion of articles to guarantee health professionals the right to conscientious objection.

In the USA, a major source of funding for anti-rights groups around the world, an avalanche of state-level restrictions on abortion rights and the rights of LGBTQI+ people, particularly transgender people, have been introduced in recent years. Also on 8 March, Florida’s legislature passed the ‘Parental Rights in Education’ bill – better known as the ‘don’t say gay’ bill – aimed at preventing teachers from speaking to students about sexual orientation and gender issues, and potentially subjecting them to lawsuits if they fail to comply.

Across the region, anti-rights movements are highly connected and run coordinated national campaigns using the same discourse, focused on opposition to what they call ‘gender ideology’. They use the same slogans and even the same symbols and aesthetics. And they work together in the international arena, co-opting spaces meant for civil society participation and attempting to hijack the main multilateral regional body, the Organization of American States (OAS).

In the Americas and beyond, anti-rights movements all follow the same tactics. These include the use of apparently legitimate channels, such as court actions, campaigning in elections, triggering referendums and participating in consultations; mobilising people in public space, including with the intent of disrupting or preventing civil society mobilisations; using and manipulating social media, including to promote narratives, recruit support, spread disinformation and conspiracy theories, promote hate speech and smear and harass progressive civil society; and enabling and sometimes even directly deploying physical violence. As foundations for these attacks, they can both borrow and distort the secular language of human rights and mobilise fundamentalist versions of religion.

Danger not averted

Anti-rights groups are in this struggle for the long haul. In Guatemala, they tested the waters, found the temperature uncomfortable and retreated strategically to continue their work, striving to create more favourable conditions for their next attempt. But overall, anti-rights groups are gaining confidence, visibility and resources. In a variety of contexts their narratives resonate and they win support from considerable segments of the public. They shape public narratives, including through disinformation and manipulation, and sow hatred. They help to make and benefit from regressive political change, and take advantage of people’s insecurities in highly uncertain times.

For now, Guatemalan women’s and LGBTQI+ groups can breathe a sigh of relief. But they must not let their guard down. There is no doubt that anti-rights groups will strike again as soon as the opportunity presents itself, and progressive civil society must be ready to fight back.