April 29, 2025

Wyden Urges Commerce Department to Establish Clear Guidelines to Prevent the Illegal Diversion of Firearms Sold Abroad

Washington, D.C. — U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore., today called on the Commerce Department to establish clear guidelines to prevent the illegal diversion of American-made firearms sold abroad.

Wyden’s letter to Commerce Department Secretary Howard Lutnick follows recent reports indicating that staffing shortages at the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), a subagency of Commerce, have hampered its ability to effectively vet foreign companies purchasing U.S.-made firearms and prevent them from diverting these weapons to terrorists or other criminals.

“End-use checks, which require on-location verification of importers’ bona fides, are the cornerstone of an effective export control policy and are paramount to ensure end user compliance with approved license agreements and to verify that controlled dual-use items like firearms are not being illicitly diverted or re-exported to bad actors,” Wyden stated in his letter to Secretary Lutnick.

These staffing shortages have also led BIS to rely in some cases on the International Trade Administration (ITA) – whose primary responsibility is to promote and facilitate U.S. commercial interests abroad – to carry out on-site inspections known as “end-use checks,” which are meant to ensure that purchasers are not merely operating as fronts to funnel American-made firearms to criminal organizations. However, in some cases, ITA staff who conducted end-use checks also recruited foreign businesses to attend a firearms trade show, posing a clear conflict of interest. 

“An official charged with national security responsibilities over certain firearms cannot and should not be the same official charged with selling the same firearms,” Wyden emphasized, raising further concerns about ITA’s serious conflict of interest in playing two very different roles at once. ITA officials may also lack the requisite training, knowledge, and investigative experience to vet foreign actors purchasing American firearms.

To prevent conflicts of interest and strengthen oversight to ensure American firearms exported abroad do not end up in the hands of foreign terrorist organizations or other bad actors, Wyden requested Secretary Lutnick create clear intra-agency guidelines and respond to the following questions:

  1. Is BIS planning on establishing an Export Control Officer position for either the Western Hemisphere or Africa?
  2. Will the Commerce Department commit to requiring BIS and ITA to develop guidance, including standard operating procedures for ITA FCS officers who are conducting end-use checks?
  3. Does ITA have a policy on allowing locally employed staff to conduct end-use monitoring?
  4. What training do ITA FCS officers currently receive regarding end-use monitoring and Export Administration Regulations?
  5. How many end-use checks for firearms or related items such as ammunition and optical devices have been conducted by ITA FCS officers in the last five calendar years? How many of these checks resulted in the denial of exports?
  6. How many firearms export licenses have been approved by BIS since February 1, 2025?

The text of the letter is here.

###