Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the first female to win the Democratic Party’s nomination to run for President in the United States, is amplifying a new op-ed she wrote for Foreign Affairs titled, ‘Women’s Rights Are Human Rights.’
Note: In 1995, at the United Nations’ Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, Clinton — at the time the First Lady of the United States — famously said, “human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights.”
Today on social media, Clinton provided a link to the article and wrote: “I can say from personal experience that Putin is threatened by strong women. As I argue in a new piece in @ForeignAffairs, he and his fellow autocrats have reason to fear us: Defending women’s rights and combating authoritarianism is the same fight.”
Note: In June 2014, Russian President Vladimir Putin said of former State Secretary Clinton, “It’s better not to argue with women,” and, “When people push boundaries too far, it’s not because they are strong but because they are weak. But maybe weakness is not the worst quality for a woman.”
I can say from personal experience that Putin is threatened by strong women.
As I argue in a new piece in @ForeignAffairs, he and his fellow autocrats have reason to fear us:
Defending women’s rights and combating authoritarianism is the same fight. https://t.co/lQBwUuovfy pic.twitter.com/Cyr2hoOeJ8
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) February 19, 2026
In the article, Clinton writes that Putin is “the most prominent practitioner and propagandist of this patriarchal approach to authoritarianism,” and that he is “the leader of an illiberal, misogynist, xenophobic international movement that wants to roll back women’s rights, expel migrants, disrupt democratic alliances, and undermine the rules-based international order.”
Clinton also noted U.S. political rhetoric “designed to pressure women into traditional roles” and cited President Donald Trump‘s “National Medal of Motherhood” for mothers with multiple children, and Vice President JD Vance who in 2021 derided Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democratic leaders as “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives.”
Clinton concluded: “Democracy is stronger and repression becomes harder to justify when women’s power is institutionalized.”
Note: The new issue of Foreign Affairs (March/April) also features the article ‘Why Putin Still Prefers War’ by Russian journalist Andrei Kolesnikov. The subhead reads: “Even if a peace deal is reached in Ukraine, the West will not be able to make Putin’s Russia go away.” He added, “The period after the peace agreement—if and when it happens—will be no less difficult than the conflict itself.”
“Even if a peace deal is reached in Ukraine, the West will not be able to make Putin’s Russia go away,” writes @AndrKolesnikov. “The period after the peace agreement—if and when it happens—will be no less difficult than the conflict itself.”https://t.co/Wj43yjFmC2
— Foreign Affairs (@ForeignAffairs) February 19, 2026