US Should Practice What It Preaches On Vietnam Religious Freedom

The US State Department acted on USCIRF's recommendation and designated Vietnam a CPC in 2004 but lifted the designation in November 2006 after bilateral negotiations in which Vietnam pledged to improve conditions by banning forced renunciations of faith, releasing prisoners and expanding the space for permissible religious activity.

The timing coincided with Vietnam's World Trade Organization accession, and USCIRF argued at the time that the removal was premature. It has called for redesignation every year since.

The State Department placed Vietnam on its Special Watch List in November 2022 - the first such action since the CPC was lifted - but has not taken further action.

However, US religious freedom advocacy carries its own credibility questions. The post-9/11 surveillance of American Muslim communities – justified, like Vietnam's own restrictions, on national security grounds – the 2017 travel ban targeting Muslim-majority countries and the Trump administration's first term alignment of“religious liberty” with conservative Christian priorities each undercut Washington's claim to be an impartial advocate of religious pluralism.

The second Trump administration has moved well beyond its predecessor, building an explicit institutional apparatus around the protection of Christianity that makes the credibility gap harder to ignore.

In February 2025, Trump signed an executive order establishing the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias across federal agencies. In May, he created a Religious Liberty Commission whose membership is drawn predominantly from conservative Christian circles.

Its chair, Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, supports prayer and displays of the Ten Commandments in public schools, while one commissioner has publicly described Islam as“a death cult.”

At the commission's inaugural announcement, Trump remarked on the principle separating church and state:“Let's forget about that for once.” His Religious Freedom Day proclamation in January 2026 cast America as“one glorious Nation under God” and urged families to gather at places of worship.

The parallel is imperfect but difficult to overlook. Vietnam's system privileges state-approved religious organizations and suppresses independent practice. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is building a policy apparatus oriented around the protection and promotion of conservative Christianity.

The scale and consequences differ considerably – the US does not operate a system that requires state approval for religious practice, even if minority faiths and non-believers have faced oppression.

But the underlying principle of state neutrality toward religion, which has underpinned the credibility of US religious freedom advocacy, is being eroded at home.