US Votes Against UN Resolution Condemning Death Penalty for Religious Speech, Sexual Orientation

The United States has vot­ed against an his­toric res­o­lu­tion passed by the United Nations Human Rights Council con­demn­ing the crim­i­nal­iza­tion of and use of the death penal­ty for apos­ta­sy, blas­phe­my, adul­tery, and con­sen­su­al same-sex rela­tions and call­ing on nations in which the death penal­ty is legal to ensure that it is not imposed ​“arbi­trar­i­ly or in a dis­crim­i­na­to­ry man­ner.” The res­o­lu­tion also called for an end to the dis­crim­i­na­to­ry use of the death penal­ty ​“against per­sons belong­ing to racial and eth­nic minori­ties … and its use against indi­vid­u­als with men­tal or intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ties,” those under age 18, and pregnant women.

In Geneva, Switzerland, the Human Rights Council on September 29 adopt­ed the res­o­lu­tion by a vote of 27 – 13, with the U.S. join­ing Botswana, Burundi, Egypt, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, China, India, Iraq, Japan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates in oppo­si­tion. No oth­er Western democ­ra­cy opposed the resolution. 

Renato Sabbadini, Executive Director of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA), called the res­o­lu­tion’s pas­sage a ​“mon­u­men­tal moment” sig­ni­fy­ing recog­ni­tion by the inter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty that cer­tain ​“hor­rif­ic laws” must end. ​“It is uncon­scionable to think that there are hun­dreds of mil­lions of peo­ple liv­ing in States where some­body may be exe­cut­ed sim­ply because of whom they love,” he said in a state­ment.

Ty Cobb, direc­tor of Human Rights Campaign Global, the glob­al branch of the U.S.‘s largest LGBT rights orga­ni­za­tion, con­demned the U.S. vote against the res­o­lu­tion as ​“beyond dis­grace­ful.” In a state­ment, he said U.S. rep­re­sen­ta­tives had ​“failed the LGBTQ com­mu­ni­ty by not stand­ing up against the bar­bar­ic use of the death penal­ty to pun­ish indi­vid­u­als in same-sex relationships.” 

A State Department spokesper­son respond­ed to crit­i­cism of the U.S.‘s vote say­ing ​“The United States unequiv­o­cal­ly con­demns the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty for homo­sex­u­al­i­ty, blas­phe­my, adul­tery and apos­ta­sy.” Heather Nauert said that the U.S. was ​“dis­ap­point­ed” to vote against the res­o­lu­tion, but did so, “[a]s in years past, … because of broad­er con­cerns with the resolution’s approach to con­demn­ing the death penal­ty in all circumstances.” 

In 2014, the Obama admin­is­tra­tion abstained from vot­ing on a death penal­ty res­o­lu­tion, issu­ing a state­ment urg­ing ​“all gov­ern­ments that employ the death penal­ty to do so in con­for­mi­ty with their inter­na­tion­al human rights oblig­a­tions.” The United States ranked sev­enth in the world in con­firmed exe­cu­tions in 2016, accord­ing to Amnesty International, behind China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Pakistan, and Egypt.