Enzi, Barrasso: We will oppose ratification of UN small arms treaty
by Joint media release
October 15, 2013
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senators Mike Enzi and John Barrasso, both R-Wyo., are continuing the fight against the controversial United Nations (U.N.) arms trade treaty that Secretary of State John Kerry signed in late September despite strong bipartisan opposition. Today (Tuesday, Oct. 15), they joined 48 other senators in sending a letter to President Obama expressing regret at the Administration’s decision to sign the treaty and stated their commitment to opposing ratification. The United States is not bound by any treaty until the Senate ratifies it with a two-thirds vote.
In the letter, the senators say that, "the treaty includes only a weak non-binding reference to the lawful ownership and use of, and trade in 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, and it creates a national ‘responsibility’ to ‘prevent . . . [the] diversion’ of firearms, which could be used to justify the imposition of controls within the U.S. that would pose a threat to the Second Amendment and infringe on the rights protected therein."
The senators also noted that "the criteria at the heart of the treaty are vague and easily politicized. They will restrict the ability of the U.S. to conduct our own foreign policy, and will steadily subject the U.S. to the influence of internationally-defined norms, a process that would impinge on our national sovereignty."
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