This page contains letters signed by elected officials, usually written to the President or relevant members of Congress.

13-UNATT on Sep 25, 2013

We write to express our concern and regret at your decision to sign the United Nations' Arms Trade Treaty. For the following reasons, we cannot give our advice and consent to this treaty:

1. The treaty violates a 2009 red line laid down by your own administration: "the rule of consensus decision-making." In April 2013, after the treaty failed to achieve consensus, it was adopted by majority vote in the UN General Assembly.
2. The treaty allows amendments by a 3/4 majority vote. When amended, it will become a source of political and legal pressure on the US to comply in practice with amendments it was unwilling to accept.
3. The treaty includes only a weak, non-binding reference to the lawful ownership and use of firearms, and recognizes none of these activities, much less individual self-defense, as fundamental individual rights. It encourages governments to collect the identities of individual end users of imported firearms at the national level, which would constitute the core of a national gun registry
4. The State Department has acknowledged that the treaty is "ambiguous." By becoming party to the treaty, the US would therefore be accepting commitments that are inherently unclear.
5. The criteria at the heart of the treaty are vague and easily politicized. They will steadily subject the US to the influence of internationally-defined norms, a process that would impinge on our national sovereignty.
6. The treaty criteria as established could hinder the US in fulfilling its strategic, legal, and moral commitments to provide arms to key allies such as Taiwan and Israel.

Participating counts on VoteMatch question 14. Question 14: Support American Exceptionalism Scores: -2=Strongly oppose; -1=Oppose; 0=neutral; 1=Support; 2=Strongly support.
• Topic: Gun Control
• Headline: Oppose the United Nations' Arms Trade Treaty (Score: 1)
  
  Participating counts on AmericansElect question 5.
• Headline: Oppose the United Nations' Arms Trade Treaty (Answer: B)
• AmericansElect Quiz Question 5 on Foreign Policy: When you think about the US pursuing its interests abroad, which of the following is closest to your opinion?
  • A: The US should always act in its own interest regardless of what other countries think
  • B: The US should rarely listen to other countries
  • C: The US should listen to other countries more often than not
  • D: The US should always listen to other countries before pursuing its own interests
  • E: Unsure
  
  
  
• Key for participation codes:
• Sponsorships: p=sponsored; o=co-sponsored; s=signed
• Memberships: c=chair; m=member; e=endorsed; f=profiled; s=scored
• Resolutions: i=introduced; w=wrote; a=adopted
• Cases: w=wrote; j=joined; d=dissented; c=concurred
• Surveys: '+' supports; '-' opposes.