Received as a fax alert.
"SCHUMER "STUDY" FLAWED, AS EXPECTED
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), is once again deliberately hijacking the BATF's firearm tracing information to promote his anti-gun agenda.
On December 20, he issued a press release touting a "study" that indicates that many firearms used in crimes are originally bought from a small number of "high crime gun stores," then quickly resold. His release, of course, also outlined his "solutions" to this alleged "problem," which
include mandating NICS checks to be conducted by a federal firearms license (FFL) holder on all private transfers of handguns and "assault weapons," and registration of these transfers.
His conclusions are based on his staff's analysis of traces of firearms by BATF, which merely perpetuates his deceptive misuse of BATF trace data contrary to the
repeated cautioning of both BATF and the Congressional Research Service (CRS).
According to the CRS, "The ATF tracing system is an operational system designed to help law enforcement agencies identify the ownership path of individual firearms. It was not designed to collect statistics ...
ATF does not always know if a firearm being traced has been used in a crime ... [A trace can occur] for any reason. No crime need be involved."
In other words, not all guns used in crime are traced, and not all guns traced were necessarily used by criminals, so any broad conclusions drawn from tracing data are fundamentally flawed.
Ironically, Schumer's "study" indicates that criminals, for the most part, don't buy guns in gun stores, and it also starkly highlights
the Clinton-Gore Administration's abominable enforcement record.
For example, Schumer notes that the background check system has resulted in
over 412,000 denials of prohibited purchasers, but he fails to note that such an attempted illegal purchase by a violent criminal is a crime carrying a 10-year federal prison sentence.
The omission of this salient detail is obviously due to the Clinton-Gore Administration's failure to prosecute more than a handful of these criminals for this serious crime.
Nobody should be surprised that a hardened criminal who is denied under NICS, but not apprehended, doesn't give up trying to get a gun.
BATF has plenty of information about potentially illegal gun sales and "straw purchases," and it is fully empowered to investigate such cases and prosecute anytime existing federal gun laws have been broken.
Unfortunately, this simply isn't happening. BATF referrals of gun law violations for prosecution to federal, state, and local attorneys have declined almost 54% during this Administration (Transactional Records
Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University).
Schumer's proposals would create a new, massive, and costly federal bureaucracy to keep computer database of law-abiding gun owners, something specifically prohibited by
federal law for more than a decade.
Such a scheme flies in the face of both the Second Amendment as well as our right to privacy, and criminals are hardly likely to start running background checks on each other just because Senator Schumer says they must."
And, on other fronts . . .
"A LOOK AT THE STATES
CALIFORNIA
SB 23, the confusing expansion of California's originally nebulous "assault weapons" ban, goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2000. NRA and the California Rifle & Pistol Association (CRPA), in a cooperative effort, are mounting an aggressive legal challenge to the law, and CRPA has
generously contributed $50,000 toward what could be a lengthy battle in several courts.
Los Angeles civil rights attorney Chuck Michel, nationally-renowned constitutional attorney Stephen Halbrook (who successfully challenged certain aspects of the Brady Act before the U.S. Supreme Court), and San Francisco civil rights attorney Don Kates will lead the legal team.
NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre stated, "[NRA is] proud to be working with CRPA to fight this ill-conceived and
dangerous law." NRA-ILA Executive Director James Jay Baker commented, "The courts have taken over 10 years since the passage of the 1989 law to try to determine exactly what an ‘assault weapon' is, and still they do not
know.
No less than four cases on the issue are now before the California Supreme Court. One of them stems from a 1998 appellate court decision which held that the entire law was unconstitutional. We look forward to
getting these issues resolved once and for all!" The case that resulted in the 1998 decision was also jointly funded by NRA and CRPA.
COLORADO
NRA-ILA will be hosting three Grassroots-Legislative Workshops in January to help prepare our members for the legislative battles that lay ahead.
The Workshops are free, and are scheduled for January 8 in Denver, January 12 in Colorado Springs, and January 15 in Grand Junction. For meeting locations, additional details, and to reserve your spot, please call the Grassroots Division at (800) 392-8683."
------------------
The New World Order has a Third Reich odor.
"SCHUMER "STUDY" FLAWED, AS EXPECTED
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), is once again deliberately hijacking the BATF's firearm tracing information to promote his anti-gun agenda.
On December 20, he issued a press release touting a "study" that indicates that many firearms used in crimes are originally bought from a small number of "high crime gun stores," then quickly resold. His release, of course, also outlined his "solutions" to this alleged "problem," which
include mandating NICS checks to be conducted by a federal firearms license (FFL) holder on all private transfers of handguns and "assault weapons," and registration of these transfers.
His conclusions are based on his staff's analysis of traces of firearms by BATF, which merely perpetuates his deceptive misuse of BATF trace data contrary to the
repeated cautioning of both BATF and the Congressional Research Service (CRS).
According to the CRS, "The ATF tracing system is an operational system designed to help law enforcement agencies identify the ownership path of individual firearms. It was not designed to collect statistics ...
ATF does not always know if a firearm being traced has been used in a crime ... [A trace can occur] for any reason. No crime need be involved."
In other words, not all guns used in crime are traced, and not all guns traced were necessarily used by criminals, so any broad conclusions drawn from tracing data are fundamentally flawed.
Ironically, Schumer's "study" indicates that criminals, for the most part, don't buy guns in gun stores, and it also starkly highlights
the Clinton-Gore Administration's abominable enforcement record.
For example, Schumer notes that the background check system has resulted in
over 412,000 denials of prohibited purchasers, but he fails to note that such an attempted illegal purchase by a violent criminal is a crime carrying a 10-year federal prison sentence.
The omission of this salient detail is obviously due to the Clinton-Gore Administration's failure to prosecute more than a handful of these criminals for this serious crime.
Nobody should be surprised that a hardened criminal who is denied under NICS, but not apprehended, doesn't give up trying to get a gun.
BATF has plenty of information about potentially illegal gun sales and "straw purchases," and it is fully empowered to investigate such cases and prosecute anytime existing federal gun laws have been broken.
Unfortunately, this simply isn't happening. BATF referrals of gun law violations for prosecution to federal, state, and local attorneys have declined almost 54% during this Administration (Transactional Records
Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University).
Schumer's proposals would create a new, massive, and costly federal bureaucracy to keep computer database of law-abiding gun owners, something specifically prohibited by
federal law for more than a decade.
Such a scheme flies in the face of both the Second Amendment as well as our right to privacy, and criminals are hardly likely to start running background checks on each other just because Senator Schumer says they must."
And, on other fronts . . .
"A LOOK AT THE STATES
CALIFORNIA
SB 23, the confusing expansion of California's originally nebulous "assault weapons" ban, goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2000. NRA and the California Rifle & Pistol Association (CRPA), in a cooperative effort, are mounting an aggressive legal challenge to the law, and CRPA has
generously contributed $50,000 toward what could be a lengthy battle in several courts.
Los Angeles civil rights attorney Chuck Michel, nationally-renowned constitutional attorney Stephen Halbrook (who successfully challenged certain aspects of the Brady Act before the U.S. Supreme Court), and San Francisco civil rights attorney Don Kates will lead the legal team.
NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre stated, "[NRA is] proud to be working with CRPA to fight this ill-conceived and
dangerous law." NRA-ILA Executive Director James Jay Baker commented, "The courts have taken over 10 years since the passage of the 1989 law to try to determine exactly what an ‘assault weapon' is, and still they do not
know.
No less than four cases on the issue are now before the California Supreme Court. One of them stems from a 1998 appellate court decision which held that the entire law was unconstitutional. We look forward to
getting these issues resolved once and for all!" The case that resulted in the 1998 decision was also jointly funded by NRA and CRPA.
COLORADO
NRA-ILA will be hosting three Grassroots-Legislative Workshops in January to help prepare our members for the legislative battles that lay ahead.
The Workshops are free, and are scheduled for January 8 in Denver, January 12 in Colorado Springs, and January 15 in Grand Junction. For meeting locations, additional details, and to reserve your spot, please call the Grassroots Division at (800) 392-8683."
------------------
The New World Order has a Third Reich odor.