Attorney General William P. Barr Releases First-Ever Semiannual Report on the Fix NICS Act

On Nov. 14, 2019, the Attorney General published and submitted to Congress the first semiannual report on the Fix NICS Act. The report, required by the Fix NICS Act passed by Congress in March 2018, reflects strong compliance with the Act and demonstrates renewed efforts at all levels of government to improve the sharing of records and information that are vital to the effective operation of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS).

“An effective NICS system is critical to ensuring that we keep guns out of the hands of those who should not have them,” said Attorney General William P. Barr. “I am encouraged by the results of this initial report. Fix NICS implementation is still in its infancy, yet already we’re seeing great strides being made across government – state, tribal, and federal law enforcement - to strengthen the NICS. Given the preliminary data, it is clear that the Fix NICS Act is well on its way to doing exactly what it was intended to do – make the NICS better.”

The NICS is a computerized system designed to help determine if a person is disqualified from possessing or receiving firearms by conducting a search of available relevant records. The databases searched by the NICS contain records with information relevant to the legal prohibitions against firearm possession and purchasing under both federal and state law. To function effectively, the NICS must have access to complete, accurate, and timely information submitted by relevant agencies in all levels of government across the country.

The 2018 Fix NICS Act was passed to encourage government agencies to improve their records submission processes and further strengthen the NICS. Under the Fix NICS Act:

Federal agencies:
- must report certain record submission metrics to the Attorney General in semiannual certifications; and
- must establish four-year implementation plans to improve records submissions.
States and tribal governments:
- are incentivized with grant preferences to establish four-year implementation plans.
The Attorney General:
- must publish and submit to Congress a semiannual report on federal agency compliance with the Act; and
- must determine whether federal agencies, states, and Indian tribal governments have achieved substantial compliance with the benchmarks set out in their implementation plans.

Report Highlights:

Compliance:

45 federal agencies submitted certifications and implementation plans
All 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Indian tribal governments established implementation plans and
Another 44 federal agencies certified they do not have any relevant records

Early Results:

The efforts by federal agencies, states, and Indian tribal governments under the Act are already paying off. Between April 2018 and August 2019:

There was an increase of over six million records in the three national databases searched with every NICS check—a 6.2 percent increase. In addition, there was a 15 percent increase in records in one of those databases, the NICS Indices.
The number of Firearm Retrieval Referrals (FRRs) (where a prohibited person is able to purchase a firearm because the background check could not be concluded within three business days due to incomplete records) decreased each month in comparison to the same month during the previous year, for an average monthly decline of 102 FRRs.
With the exception of June 2018, there was an increase in the percentage of NICS checks resulting in an immediate determination (not requiring a delay for further research) compared to the previous year. Specifically, there was an average increase of 0.51 percent for each month when compared with the same month of the previous year.

From May 2019 through July 2019, the military branches enhanced their record reporting by increasing entries into the Controlled Substance category by 10 percent, with an overall increase in multiple categories of 2.63 percent.
The U.S. Customs and Border Protection entered approximately 13 million illegal or unlawful alien records into the NICS Indices in October 2019.

Although the implementation plans have been in place for just a few months, these early indicators are encouraging. As the plans are executed over the next several years, the Department of Justice expects to see a real and lasting positive impact on NICS records and operations.

The complete report can be accessed here: https://www.justice.gov/ag/fix-nics-report-2019.

military branches enhanced their record reporting by increasing entries into the Controlled Substance category by 10 percent...

Federal and state have medical records on 45% of us that show the addictions, misuse of substances and SDOH... Social Determinants of Health.

SDOH is big right now. Watch for gun ownership to be labeled an SDOH. Watch if privacy of gun ownership information is treated the same was and other SDOH.

Watch which Politically Correct SDOH are omitted. For example, Poverty is listed as a SDOH. But divide any demographi group into those with a correlation to single parent families and we discover that poverty and poor health are correlated. But the correlation with single parent households is much greater. And guess which of the three is the cause of the correlation.

Watch SDOH work behind the scenes to determine who gets what.

"The databases searched by the NICS contain records with information relevant to the legal prohibitions against firearm possession and purchasing under both federal [??? emphasis added] and state law. "

I respectfully disagree with Attorney General William P. Barr on this issue.

From related threads…

Regarding federal possession and purchasing laws for firearms, the congressional record shows that Rep. John Bingham, a constitutional lawmaker, had officially clarified that the states had never expressly constitutionally given the feds the specific power to make peacetime penal laws, not even for murder.

"Our Constitution never conferred upon the Congress of the United States the power - sacred as life is, first as it is before all other rights which pertain to man on this side of the grave - to protect it in time of peace by the terrors of the penal code within organized states; and Congress has never attempted to do it. There never was a law upon the United States statute-book to punish the murderer for taking away in time of peace the life of the noblest, and the most unoffending, as well, of your citizens, within the limits of any State of the Union, The protection of the citizen in that respect was left to the respective States, and there the power is to-day [emphases added].” —Rep. John Bingham, Congressional Globe. (See bottom half of third column.)
”From the accepted doctrine that the United States is a government of delegated powers, it follows that those not expressly granted, or reasonably to be implied from such as are conferred, are reserved to the states, or to the people. To forestall any suggestion to the contrary, the Tenth Amendment was adopted. The same proposition, otherwise stated, is that powers not granted are prohibited [emphasis added].” —United States v. Butler, 1936.

Next, regarding over counter purchasing laws, consider this. Regardless what FDR’s state sovereignty-ignoring Supreme Court activist justices wanted everybody to think about the scope of Congress’s Commerce Clause powers (1.8.3) when it wrongly decided Wickard v. Filburn in Congress’s favor imo, FDR’s justices evidently “overlooked” the following. A previous generation of state sovereignty-respecting justices had clarified that the states have never expressly constitutionally given the feds the specific power to regulate INTRAstate commerce.

"State inspection laws, health laws, and laws for regulating the internal commerce of a State, and those which respect turnpike roads, ferries, &c. are not within the power granted to Congress [emphases added]." -Gibbons v. Ogden, 1824.

The reason that probably most patriots now think that the feds can make any little law that they want to is this. Patriots have grown up with corrupt, unconstitutionally big federal government and have been indoctrinated to think that anything the feds do is somehow constitutional.

In fact, it is disturbing that federal peacetime gun regulations seem to have started appearing in the books during FDR Administration, FDR and the Congress at that time infamous for making laws which they had no express constitutional authority to make.

Franklin Roosevelt: The Father of Gun Control

Patriots who value their constitutionally enumerated protections need to consider that Acts 22:25-29 shows that Apostle Paul got out of a flogging by claiming his Roman citizenship, and get themselves up to speed on the fed's constitutionally limited powers.

Again, it’s hard to justify federal NICS under the Constitution imo.

Corrections, insights welcome.

Remember in November 2020!

MAGA! Now KAG! (Keep America Great!)

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