The anti-gun lobby in Congress has had a bad week. On five separate occasions, House committees voted to beat back their attempts at forcing through new restrictions:
First, on Wed. July 13, by a vote of 25 to 16, the [House Appropriations] committee approved Rep. Denny Rehberg’s (R-Mont.) amendment to the 2012 Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies appropriations bill, prohibiting the BATFE from requiring firearm dealers in states bordering Mexico to file reports on certain rifle sales. The Justice Department had announced earlier in the week that the BATFE would soon begin requiring dealers to file the reports on individuals who buy two or more detachable-magazine semi-automatic rifles larger than .22 caliber within a period of five business days.
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By a vote of 28-19, the committee also approved Rep. John Carter’s (R-Texas) amendment to stop BATFE from prohibiting the importation of shotguns that have one or more various features disliked by the BATFE, most of which are common to firearms used for protection or sport. Such features include adjustable stocks and extended magazine tubes. Rep. Carter, like Rep. Rehberg, is a member of the Congressional Sportsmen’s Caucus, and believes that “federal gun regulations often create burdens for law-abiding citizens and infringe upon constitutional rights provided by the Second Amendment.”
Anti-gun Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.) was not so successful with her amendment to authorize the Attorney General to prohibit the possession of firearms by anyone whose name appears on the FBI’s secretive terrorist watchlist. Her proposal failed by a vote of 27-18, indicating that a majority on the committee understands the many problems with this idea. Chief among those is that 95 percent of people on the watchlist are already prohibited from possessing firearms in the U.S. because they are not citizens or legal residents of the United States. In March, a similar amendment pushed by Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) was rejected by the House Judiciary Committee by a vote of 21-11.
Joining Lowey in defeat was Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), whose amendment to gut the law that limits BATFE firearm trace data to law enforcement agencies failed by a vote of 27-20. Schiff alleged that the law—the Tiahrt Amendment, hated by gun control groups—had impeded the congressional investigation of BATFE’s “Fast and Furious” debacle. However, members of Congress leading that investigation disagreed. In a letter to House Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform, and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said, “the Tiahrt provision has not impeded our investigation. The provision has not been cited by anyone from whom we have sought information as a reason to deny our requests.”
Next, in a Thurs. July 14 voice vote on the House floor, the House adopted an amendment to the Energy and Water Appropriations bill (H.R. 2354—which passed the House on July 15) prohibiting expenditures to enforce the Army Corps of Engineers regulation that bans gun possession on the 11 million acres of land and water the Corps manages. The amendment, sponsored by Reps. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), Bob Gibbs (R-Ohio) and Jason Altmire (D-Pa.) will enhance self-defense rights for law-abiding Americans who hunt, camp and fish on Corps property. (Rep. Gibbs, joined by the other lawmakers, has previously sponsored H.R. 1865, the “Recreational Lands Self-Defense Act,” to overturn the Corps’ anti-gun rule.) Commenting on the amendment, Rep. Altmire noted, “It is important for sportsmen to be able to defend themselves while they legally hunt and fish on property that the Corps owns and operates, much of which is in rural areas without adequate law enforcement.”
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