When American Adherence to the Death Penalty Gets in the Way of International Human Rights

When I saw reports circulating that the U.S. had voted against a U.N. resolution condemning the death penalty for homosexuality, I knew there must be some official justification. And lo and behold, there is. Here is what U.S. State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert had to say at a press briefing on October 3rd:

As our representative to the Human Rights Council said last Friday, the United States is disappointed to have voted against that resolution. We voted against that resolution because of broader concerns with the resolution’s approach in condemning the death penalty in all circumstances, and it called for the abolition of the death penalty altogether. We had hoped for a balanced and inclusive resolution that would better reflect the positions of states that continue to apply the death penalty lawfully, as the United States does. The United States unequivocally condemns the application of the death penalty for conduct such as homosexuality, blasphemy, adultery, and apostasy. We do not consider such conduct appropriate for criminalization.

I took the time to read the resolution in full. The rhetoric in its front matter does point to the abolition of the death penalty as the ultimate goal; it was for this reason that Obama administration abstained from (but did not vote against) a similar resolution in 2014. The resolution’s overall focus, however, is on condemning the human rights violations that often accompany its use worldwide, and while the resolution asks countries to “consider” ratifying an optional protocol supporting the abolition of the death penalty, it does not require it.

The human rights violations the resolution condemns include discriminatory implementation of the death penalty; a lack of adequate representation or legal hearing for those accused; the use of the death penalty for children or those with mental disabilities; and the imposition of the death penalty for crimes like blasphemy, apostasy, adultery, or homosexuality.

Here are the action items included in the resolution:

The few remaining items are procedural.

This resolution didn’t just condemn the death penalty for homosexuality. It also condemned the death penalty for apostasy and blasphemy. How many American evangelicals (not to mention Americans more generally) are horrified by countries whose penal codes condemn to death those who convert to Christianity from Islam? Consider Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, who became an evangelical cause célèbre after she was condemned to death in Sudan for converting to Christianity. These are the kinds of abuses the resolution was meant to condemn.

The United States has twisted itself into a pretzel on this issue—and I’m not just talking about this administration. Our nation has become so entangled with the death penalty that its devotion to capital punishment is is becoming a barrier to its ability to most effectively oppose grave human rights abuses abroad. The Trump administration, after all, just voted against a measure intended to condemn things like Pakistan’s blasphemy death sentence for Asia Bibi, another Christian woman whose trial was the cause célèbre of American evangelicals.

The Trump administration didn’t start this, but in voting against this resolution when it could have at the very least abstained from voting on the resolution as the U.S. did under Obama, the Trump administration took this entanglement further than previous administrations.