Terrorists and Guns: The Nature of the Threat and Proposed Reforms

U.S. Senate website ^

[Neil E. Wright]

H/T Mike at SipseyStreetIrregulars

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Terrorists and Guns: The Nature of the Threat and Proposed Reforms

Wednesday, May 5, 2010
10:00 AM
Dirksen Senate Office Building, room 342

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Witnesses

Panel 1

• The Honorable Frank R. Lautenberg

  
  U.S. Senate

• The Honorable Peter T. King

  
  U.S. House of Representatives

• The Honorable Michael R. Bloomberg

  
  Mayor
  City of New York

• The Honorable Raymond W. Kelly

  
  Police Commissioner
  City of New York

Panel 2

• Daniel D. Roberts

  
  Assistant Director, Criminal Justice Information Services Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation
  U.S. Department of Justice

• Eileen R. Larence

  
  Director, Homeland Security and Justice
  U.S. Government Accountability Office

• Sandy Jo MacArthur

  
  Assistant Chief, Office of Administrative Services
  Los Angeles Police Department

• Aaron Titus

  
  Privacy Director
  Liberty Coalition

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Background information:

In February 2004, then Attorney General Alberto Gonzales directed the Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Legal Policy (OLP) to form a working group to review federal firearms and explosives laws*particularly in regard to NICS background checks*to determine whether additional authority should be sought from Congress to prevent firearms and explosives transfers to known and suspected terrorists. In the 111th Congress, Senator Frank Lautenberg and Representative Peter King have reintroduced a bill (S. 1317/H.R. 2159) that would authorize the Attorney General to deny the transfer of firearms or the issuance of firearms and explosives licenses to known or suspected terrorists. This bill reportedly reflects a legislative proposal developed by DOJ.

In general, this bill would amend the Gun Control Act (GCA) to grant the Attorney General the discretionary authority to deny a firearm transfer or state-issued firearms permit to any prospective transferee or permittee through Brady background checks, if the Attorney General determines that the prospective transferee is known (or appropriately suspected) to be or to have been engaged in conduct constituting, preparation for, in aid of, or related to terrorism, or providing material support or resources for terrorism, and has a reasonable belief that the prospective transferee may use the firearm in connection with terrorism (proposed 18 U.S.C. §§ 922A and B). The bill would make similar amendments to the provisions of the GCA governing the processes by which federal firearms dealer licenses are issued and revoked (18 U.S.C. §§ 923(d) and (e)).

The bill would also amend the GCA provision (18 U.S.C. § 922(g)) that enumerates several classes of persons who are prohibited from shipping, transporting, possessing, or receiving a firearm or ammunition, so that it would include persons who were the subject of terrorism-related determinations (described above). The bill would amend the GCA provision (18 U.S.C. § 922(d)) that prohibits any person from transferring a firearm to any prohibited person to include any person who was the subject of a terrorism-related determination as well. In addition, the bill would amend the NICS background check provisions (18 U.S.C. § 922(t)) to reflect that the Attorney General would have this new discretionary authority under the proposed 18 U.S.C. §§ 922A and B.

With regard to NICS denials of firearms transfers or state-issued firearms permits based upon terrorist watch list hits and subsequent determinations by the Attorney General, the bill would amend the Brady Act (P.L. 103-159) to allow a denied prospective transferee to request from the Attorney General the reasons for the denial, but it would also give the Attorney General the authority to withhold those reasons if he determines that such a disclosure would compromise national security. The bill would make a similar amendment to the Brady Act in regard to correction of erroneous information.

Furthermore, the bill would amend the GCA provision that addresses erroneous denials (18 U.S.C. § 925A), to allow any person denied a firearms-related transfer or permit to challenge that determination in U.S. court within 60 days of that determination. This proposed amendment would require the court to sustain the Attorney General’s determination upon a showing by the U.S. Government a preponderance of evidence standard that the determination satisfied the proposed provisions described above (18 U.S.C. §§ 922A and B). The proposed amendment would also allow the court to rely upon summaries or redacted versions of documents underlying those determinations, if those documents contained information that could compromise national security, but it would also allow a court to review the full, undisclosed documents ex parte and in camera at the court’s option or on the motion of the petitioner (denied person). The proposed amendment would also allow the court to determine whether the summaries or redacted versions of the documents were fair and accurate representations of the underlying documents; however, it would not allow the court to overturn the Attorney General’s determination based on the full and un-redacted documents.

[Neil E. Wright]

They're laying the groundwork to declare anyone, for any reason, a terrorist, and to deny them rights under the 2nd Amendment.

BOHICA

★ FREEDOM! ★

[Neil E. Wright]

Lautenberg's at it again, the traitorous prick.

The "panels" are hardly balanced ... it's like a who's who of gun grabbers .... :@

Time to let them know, in NO UNCERTAIN TERMS .... "FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS!!!!!!!!!!!"

★ FREEDOM! ★

[Jet Jaguar]

ping.

[TigersEye]

There is only one legitimate Federal gun law.

Amendment II

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,
the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

[Southack]

Interesting, yet not “Breaking News”. Sortof like a policeman who leaves his siren on all day long, at some point, people start to tune you out if you are always on “Red Alert”.

[Neil E. Wright]

I put it in "breaking" because NO ONE, not even the hard core 2A groups caught this. They sneaked this in, and even long-time guardians of firearms rights were caught unawares by this announcement. The "hearings" are tomorrow.

★ FREEDOM! ★

[Neil E. Wright]

well, actually, TODAY now, since it is after midnight. The hearings are at 10am TODAY.

★ FREEDOM! ★

[The Magical Mischief Tour]

I’ve said it since the Heller decision and with the upcoming McDonald decision.

They won’t be able to outlaw guns once SCOTUS incorporates the 2A, so they will just set about turning us all into criminals. Thereby banning us from owning guns.

Its actually a brilliant move on the part of the Commies, because the courts have continuously upheld restrictions on gun possession and ownership by people convicted of certain crimes, mentally challenged or who have a “history” of violence or violence tendencies.

They will begin by adding militias to terrorist watch lists as well as placing those deemed to be anti-government on the list as well.

Once that is established then the mission creep will set in as some group buried n the bowels of DOJ sets about “defining” others as anti-government, militias and terrorists.

Its the perfect fix, one the courts will be reluctant to stop because once they do it will call into question such prohibitions as non-violent convicted felons, misdemeanor domestic violence convictions etc... who are already denied guns.

[oyez]

Challenge accepted.

[muddler]

In reality, these two bills should be re-named the "Gun Owners Are Probably Terrorists Act," and the "National Firearm Registry Act," respectively. Collectively these bills strip citizens of their enumerated Constitutional Right to Bear Arms without any meaningful due process, and create a national firearms registry.

http://www.libertycoalition.net/written-statement-liberty-coalitionon-%E2%80%9Cterrorists-

[Thunder90]

The Dims are blaming the Tea Party and Republicans for Islamic terrorist attacks again, by saying that we “harass” Muslims and have caused the to go bad.

[Dan Nunn]

NRA-ILA has been on this for a while. What about the states, like PA, that do their own background checks and bypass NICS?

[Lazamataz]

Oh, that’s rich. On a year when 90% of Democrats will be losing their seats, Lautenberg is trying to bump the number to 100%.

[davidosborne]

If you are on my FACEBOOK please bump my post on there as well... This hearing begins in an hour and a half and thanks to this thread I now know about it.. this one was completely off my radar... thanks for posting this.. we ALL need to be watching this one very closely..

http://www.facebook.com/david.osborne1?ref=profile

[davidosborne]

If you are on my FACEBOOK please bump my post on there as well... This hearing begins in an hour and a half and thanks to this thread I now know about it.. this one was completely off my radar... thanks for posting this.. we ALL need to be watching this one very closely..

http://www.facebook.com/david.osborne1?ref=profile

[E.G.C.]

BTTT

[bamahead]

Libertarian ping! Click here to get added or here to be removed or post a message here!
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[davidosborne]

This hearing will be live on CSPAN-3 at 10AM ugh... a lot of cable subscribers dont get CSPAN-3 but you can stream it from the net..

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

Thanks for ping, FRiend.

[davidosborne]

As always, my pleasure, I am glad I saw this post this morning or this hearing would have never been on my radar scope.. gotta love them FReepers..

TOWARD VICTORY AND FREEDOM MY FRiend.