As the pro-national sovereignty movement continues to surge in Europe following the historic British “Brexit” vote to exit the European Union, a growing push for a United States “Amexit” from the United Nations and other international institutions is gaining steam. After the Brexit, Kentucky Republican Congressman Thomas Massie (shown being sworn in), a leading constitutionalist, pointed to his support for the American Sovereignty Restoration Act and asked if it is now “Time for #amexit?” Yes, he says. Conservative commentator Sarah Palin also called for a U.S. withdrawal from the UN following Brexit, saying Americans should take a lesson from the British on restoring independence and stopping “special-interest globalists.” Former Congressman Ron Paul, meanwhile, the author of the original legislation to get the United States out of the UN, called for getting out of NATO and the “various phony ‘free trade’ agreements” that benefit the elite but harm everyone else. And the movement to restore self-government is only growing.
Responding to the Brexit, Representative Massie said in an online post: “Time for #amexit? I’m a cosponsor of H.R. 1205 to get the US out of the UN. #brexit.” When asked in a comment why it would be a good idea, the congressman responded: “In one word, Sovereignty.” “As a member of the UN, we bind our citizens to decisions made by undemocratic countries, when in fact our constitution should be the supreme law,” he explained, garnering massive support from readers. His note sparked headlines across America, in addition to being shared thousands of times by supporters on social media. The legislation he was referring to, the American Sovereignty Restoration Act, was introduced last year by Representative Mike Rogers (R-Ala.). Sources tell The New American that members of Congress have been receiving a great deal of pressure from constituents to pass it in recent days.
In a radio interview with host Vince Coakley, Representative Massie noted that the bill was not a response to Brexit, as the latest iteration of the bill was actually introduced in Congress last year. But now is a good time to move it forward. “Who would be crazy enough to stay in the United Nations and pay the majority of their funding while it’s attended by Third World dictators who are writing rules and regulations that are supposed to bind our country? That’s what I want to ask,” the popular congressman said. The host agreed, saying it was an “excellent question.” On being asked why America should withdraw from the UN, Massie pointed out that over half of the UN’s member governments were unfree, pointing specifically to North Korea, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Cuba, Venezuela, and more. “Stalin was a founding member of the United Nations,” Massie added.
The popular Kentucky congressman also systematically debunked the talking points used by advocates of surrendering U.S. sovereignty to the global body. “People talk about ‘we need to stay on it because we’ve got this special position, we’ve got veto power because we’re one of the permanent members,’ well, guess what, so are China and Russia,” Massie said. “Now, ostensibly, this organization exists to keep us from going to war. I would say they failed at that. If anything, it’s nuclear weapons and the desire not to blow ourselves up that’s kept us from going to war. Yet we keep getting in all these small wars around the globe.” Indeed, UN resolutions have been cited on numerous occasions by U.S. presidents to justify unconstitutional, undeclared wars. The most recent and obvious example, of course, was Obama’s illegal war on Libya, which had non-establishment members of both parties in Congress calling for impeachment. The result of that war: tragedy and terror that defies belief.
Another UN selling point is what the UN disingenuously terms “human rights,” which as this magazine and others have documented extensively, means something very different than what the U.S. Founders intended with the Bill of Rights protecting Americans’ God-given rights. “Look at the membership of this organization!” said Massie. “How the heck are you going to promote human rights when these are the members. And when China and Russia have veto power, of course they are going to stick up for their Third World dictatorships that they’ve allied themselves with. So it really doesn’t have a good track record when it comes to human rights when we have some of the biggest abusers of human rights as members of the United Nations.” Indeed, UN military and police forces around the world are facing a tsunami of scandals over atrocities, including the systematic rape and abuse of children in nations occupied by UN “peace” forces and the subsequent persecution of whistleblowers who exposed it.
The UN’s attacks on gun rights are also troublesome, Massie said. “Finally, the thing that concerns me the most here recently, they promoted laws, a treaty — an international treaty they are pushing — to curb small arms trafficking,” he explained. “Now, think about this, if the United Nations is populated with Third World dictators, what interest do they have in civilians owning firearms? I’ll tell you, absolutely none. They don’t want their civilians to own firearms. So when they talk about an international treaty to prevent small arms trafficking, what they’re talking about is keeping civilians from owning firearms. So it should come as no surprise that that’s what this treaty is aimed at.” Just last month after the jihadist terror attack in Orlando, the UN’s “human rights” chief, Jordanian prince Zeid Al Hussein, claimed the U.S. government had an “obligation” to impose what he called “robust gun control.”
As for the UN’s anti-gun rights treaty, Massie said it was unconstitutional even if ratified. “It would have to be ratified by the Senate, now that’s one thing that concerns me, [Secretary of State] John Kerry has signed it, but think about this, I don’t even think this is constitutional for us to sign into a treaty without it going through the House of Representatives,” he said. “This treaty would infringe on our Constitution, so I don’t see how you can take away constitutional rights just by consulting one body of Congress, without consulting the other.” Indeed, the Founders and the Supreme Court have already made abundantly clear that treaties cannot grant new powers to the federal government that were not delegated in the U.S. Constitution. Still, internationalists are fervently promoting the false and dangerous idea that UN treaties can trump the U.S. Constitution.
Then there is the squandering of U.S. tax dollars and the congregation of dictators on U.S. soil. “To add insult to injury, we pay probably about $8 billion per year to the United Nations, we are the biggest funder of the United Nations,” Massie continued. “So there are a litany of reasons why we should pass H.R. 1205, we call it the American Sovereignty Restoration Act. And among other things, we say get the U.S. out of the UN; this bill would also get the UN out of the U.S.,” he said. “They’ve basically been free parking in New York City — I don’t mean just parking, they run up tickets, they’ve got diplomatic immunity, and their headquarters is right in New York. So this is where all the dictators come, to congregate in our country to promulgate rules that would affect our citizens.”
As an example of U.S. sovereignty being eroded, Massie pointed to a recent ruling by the World Trade Organization purporting to override the U.S. Congress on its Country of Origin labels for meat. While WTO is not a UN agency, it is a clear example of how international organizations are increasingly usurping Americans’ right to govern themselves under the Constitution. UN bosses and experts now regularly lecture and harangue Americans on alleged “requirements” under what the UN calls “international law.” Just this year, a group of self-styled UN “experts” demanded that the United States ratify a treaty and amend the U.S. Constitution to conform with the treaty, which the Senate has thus far refused to ratify. And the attacks are only getting more blatant and extreme.
Massie noted that the American Sovereignty Restoration Act was originally introduced in 1997 by then-Congressman Ron Paul, a Texas Republican who for decades was America’s leading constitutionalist in Congress. “It has had as many as 50 plus co-sponsors in the past,” he said. “Hopefully all the attention given to the Brexit will help us raise the profile of this bill, which we’re calling Amexit. In the past, the United States has withheld funding to the United Nations. Now, they eventually paid it back, but by withholding funding, they were able to negotiate a lower fee to be a member. When it did come to a vote we came just 70 votes short of cutting funding for the United Nations, and 70 votes is not a lot. You know, you flip 35 votes and it’s passed, out of 435. I think there will be more attention paid to it as time goes on, I think we’re going to pick up momentum. This was trending yesterday on Facebook, this issue. The only way to move it forward is to get more co-sponsors in the house.”
Coakley, the host, also urged all listeners to call Congress and ask their representatives to advance the legislation. Massie agreed, saying, “Absolutely, that’s how we move this bill forward.” He also suggested that, if Speaker Paul Ryan would allow separate funding bills, lawmakers could offer an amendment cutting off funds for the UN to the legislation funding the U.S. State Department. “Even if a member of the House or Senate does not support this bill, the question, I think, that deserves a debate, is how much should the United States pay the United Nations? Right now it’s on the order of $8 billion, and we’re just one of 193 members yet we’re paying over a fifth of the bill. So even if you don’t want to withdraw completely, how much is it worth and how much should we keep paying for dismal results?”
Other champions of the Constitution are calling for an Amexit from other internationalist outfits, too. In his June 27 column, Ron Paul asked whether after Brexit, the United States could exit a few things as well. “Is Brexit the first victory in a larger freedom movement?” Paul asked. “Can we get out of a system that creates money out of thin air to benefit the ruling class while impoverishing the middle class? Can we get out of a central bank that finances the wars that make us less safe? Can we exit Executive Orders? Can we exit the surveillance state? The PATRIOT Act? Can we exit NDAA and indefinite detention? Can we exit the US worldwide drone program, that kills innocents overseas and makes us ever-more hated?”
“Getting out of NATO would be a good first move,” the former congressman explained. “This Cold War relic survives only by stirring up conflict and then selling itself as the only option to confront the conflict it churned up. Wouldn’t it be better to not go looking for a fight in the first place? Do we really need still another NATO military exercise on the Russian border? It should be no surprise that NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was fear-mongering on the eve of the Brexit vote, warning UK citizens that if they vote to leave they could face increased terrorism. Likewise, the US would do well to exit the various phony ‘free trade’ agreements that provide advantage to the well-connected elites while harming the rest of us. The act of exit is liberating. We should make a longer list of those things we would like to get out of. I am only getting started.”
Some have also taken the Brexit opportunity to call for states to leave the union. In a column at Forbes, Doug Bandow, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute, said it might be good if some American states pushed for an “Amexit” from the union. “Washington, a city filled with government buildings and housing a distinct ruling class, looks an awful lot like Brussels,” he argued. “Washington also operates much the same way, an overbearing Leviathan more interested in regulating and dictating than liberating and empowering. If the United Kingdom would do better outside of the European Union, might not individual and groups of states do better outside of the American union? … Americans would be better off if they slew Leviathan and started over. It’s time for a vote on Amexit.”
The John Birch Society, a constitutionalist organization and the parent company of this magazine with chapters in all 50 states, has been pushing for a U.S. withdrawal from the UN for five decades. The organization also advocates withdrawing from pseudo-free trade deals similar to the ones used to trick Europeans into surrendering their independence to the EU. After the Brexit, JBS CEO Art Thompson said Americans should get active in pushing for an Amexit from globalist institutions that compromise the independence, liberties, and self-government of the American people.
“Enough of the British people were able to recognize the entangling aspects of their alliance with the EU to vote for Brexit,” he said in a statement. “Americans promoting Amexit likewise understand the problems with entangling alliances. Washington and Jefferson warned us against such alliances. It is time we heed their words or we will lose our independence, not just control over our own economy. It is not free trade if government is involved. Free trade is between free people, free businesses, not between governments.”
A number of other conservative, constitutionalist, and libertarian heavyweights have started pushing for an end to U.S. involvement in the UN, NATO, the WTO, NAFTA, the Obama-backed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the U.S.-EU scheme known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), and more. With the Brexit, the British have shown that it can be done, and that the globalists lied when they claimed the sky would fall. American independence is under assault like never before. UN boss Ban Ki-moon is even claiming the UN, widely ridiculed as the dictators club, is actually the “Parliament of Humanity.” Now is the time for Americans across the political spectrum to join forces against the globalist establishment and demand a restoration of U.S. sovereignty and self-government. If the British can do it, Americans can too.
Alex Newman is a correspondent for The New American, covering economics, education, politics, and more. Follow him on Twitter @ALEXNEWMAN_JOU. He can be reached at [email protected].
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