U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley has threatened to tell the president the names of countries who voted on an upcoming draft resolution in the General Assembly that would criticize the U.S. for recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital,according to a memo obtained by the Guardian.
“The president will be watching this vote carefully and has requested I report back on those who voted against us,” Haley reportedly wrote.
Here’s the thing: Every single U.N. resolution vote is recorded for posterity. There’s an entire, easily navigable search section that will tell you who voted for whatever. Anyone in the White House could look this up the instance this occurred. For Haley to write these down, fly back to Washington, then drive to the White House is an absurd waste of time.
What she meant was a threat—one she reiterated with several social media posts.
At the UN we’re always asked to do more & give more. So, when we make a decision, at the will of the American ppl, abt where to locate OUR embassy, we don’t expect those we’ve helped to target us. On Thurs there’ll be a vote criticizing our choice. The US will be taking names. pic.twitter.com/ZsusB8Hqt4
— Archive: Ambassador Nikki Haley (@AmbNikkiHaley) December 19, 2017
She even Instagrammed it with the same caption but added an additional threat about taking names by using the hashtag #TakingNames.
The point of the U.N.—it should probably be noted—is to foster international consensus. That occurred on Monday when a U.N. Security Council Resolution was put forth criticizing the U.S. for recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. It received the support of 14 members on the council, but its lone dissenter, the U.S., exercised its veto power.
Haley called it an “insult” and said the security council should be “embarrassed” by its actions.
If Haley needs to save some time, she can simply copy-paste the list of nations that voiced support for the resolution. Those would be: China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, Bolivia, Egypt, Ethiopia, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Senegal, Sweden, Ukraine, and Uruguay.
Update 1:19pm CT, Dec. 20: At the beginning of his cabinet meeting today, President Trump threatened to cut off U.S. aid to any country that voted to condemn the U.S.
“All these nations that take our money and then vote against us at the Security Council or the assembly, they take hundreds of millions of dollars and billions of dollars and they vote against us. Well, we’re watching those votes. Let them vote against us, we’ll save a lot. We don’t care.”
Update 12:31pm CT, Dec. 21: The U.N. voted overwhelmingly, 128-9, to declare the U.S.’s recognition of Jerusalem “null and void.”
