Newsweek Push Anti-gun Agenda with Phony Gun Trace Numbers

AmmoLand ^ | 9 August, 2024 | Dean Weingarten

[marktwain]

In an article published by Newsweek on August 7, 2024, Dan Gooding AND Billal Rahman make some incendiary claims. From the article:

Immigration into the United States is being partly driven by gun violence — which itself is fueled by firearms bought in the U.S. and illegally transported back to Mexico by organized crime networks.

Over 200,000 firearms found in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico between 2015 and 2022 were linked back to the U.S., recent data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) shows.

The 200,000 number seemed interesting. This correspondent went to the ATF website to look at the original data from the ATF on traces.  The ATF website provides links for traces of Central America and Mexico. The data is given by year for Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Panama. Only seven years of data is given for Nicaragua. For Mexico, the data is linked to five-year aggregates, but the total for each year is given. It is not hard to dig out how many firearms were shown to have come from the United States each year. The data is divided into various categories. A major division is U.S. Sourced Firearms and Undetermined Source Country for Firearms.

Using the ATF data, the U.S. Sourced Firearms were totaled for 2015 through 2022. The results are as follows:

• Belize – 285
• Costa Rica – 65
• El Salvador – 6,954
• Guatemala – 5,913
• Honduras – 1,989
• Panama 1,921 
• Nicaragua –  (only 7 years listed) 17

The total traced back to the United States for El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras for the eight years 2015-2022 was 14,856. The total for Mexico

[marktwain]

Gun to be traced are not the same as guns from the USA. The numbers used in Newsweek article are numbers of guns submitted to the ATF to trace. About 60% of those submitted were found to have come from the USA.

[rktman]

Hopefully they find all those “ghost” guns hiding in “the cloud” right over our heads. 👆🔫☁

[libertylover]

We don’t have a gun problem; we have a behavior problem.

[Sirius Lee]

Did they mention that Eric Holder was the one who sold them?

[antidemoncrat]

I’m sure if the US began confiscating guns, criminals, gang bangers and illegals would be the first ones to lineup and surrender their guns. I’m also sure the cartels would not immediately start sending thousands of guns across the US Southern Border into the hands of the aforementioned gun owners.

[coloradan]

It’s somehow not misinformation when they do it.

[DesertRhino]

Fast and furious again. Highlight foreign crime and use that as an excuse to end the second amendment.

[G Larry]

And none of this address the firearms traffic from China to South and Central America.

[marktwain]

Correct. Using trace numbers is simply silly. It is a publicity stunt, meant for PR. There is no significant analysis.