{"id":26580,"date":"2018-08-07T17:57:17","date_gmt":"2018-08-07T17:57:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2018\/08\/07\/trumps-arms-sales-nominee-bogged-down-by-3d-gun-debate\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T22:20:32","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T22:20:32","slug":"trumps-arms-sales-nominee-bogged-down-by-3d-gun-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/congress\/2018\/08\/07\/trumps-arms-sales-nominee-bogged-down-by-3d-gun-debate\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s arms sales nominee bogged down by 3D gun debate"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 A U.S. State Department nomination that should have been a victory lap for the Trump administration\u2019s efforts to boost U.S. arms sales abroad<\/a> instead has become caught up in a separate domestic controversy, likely for weeks to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Ed Markey has a \u201chold\u201d on R. Clarke Cooper, who is nominated as the next assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs, until the Trump administration reverses a decision to permit an organization from posting blueprints online for 3D-printed guns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cooper would oversee State\u2019s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls, which is at the center of legal action over the gun blueprints. Mainly, Cooper would be charged with linking the Defense Department with the State Department in areas such as international security, military operations and defense strategy (though industry watchers have dinged<\/a> State for a 30 percent vacancy rate at the directorate).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Undersecretary for Arms Control and International Security Andrea Thompson, a former national security adviser to Vice President Mike Pence, was named in April, and other political appointees at the assistant secretary tier have been seated in recent weeks. Cooper would replace Tina Kaidanow<\/a>, a career foreign service officer and the acting assistant secretary for political-military affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A diplomat in the Bush administration and combat veteran, Cooper serves as director of intelligence planning for Joint Special Operations Command\u2019s Joint Inter-Agency Task Force \u2014 National Capital Region, according to a White House biography. It\u2019s not mentioned in the bio, but Cooper was chief of Log Cabin Republicans when it challenged the Pentagon\u2019s \u201cdon\u2019t ask, don\u2019t tell\u201d policies toward gay troops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aside from President Donald Trump\u2019s personal support for international arms deals, his administration has in recent months rolled out new policies to emphasize the benefits of such sales to the U.S. economy: the Conventional Arms Transfer policy and others governing the international sale, transfer and subsequent use of U.S.-origin military and civil unmanned aerial systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

American weapons sales have hit record highs<\/a> in recent months. In the first two quarters of this fiscal year, the U.S. has signed $46.9 billion in weapons sales to foreign partners and allies, smashing past the $41.9 billion figure from all of fiscal 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\t