Five Crazy Attempts to Weaken Federal Gun Laws

http://www.thenation.com/blog/169025/five-crazy-attempts-weaken-federal-gun-laws



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More guns for veterans with mental issues. In October, the House passed HR 2349, the Veterans’ Benefits Act of 2011. The bill, which is awaiting action in the Senate, contains a provision introduced by Representative Danny Rehberg of Montana that would forbid the Department of Veterans’ Affairs “from determining a beneficiary to be mentally incompetent for the purposes of gun control, unless such a determination were made by a judge, magistrate, or other judicial authority based upon a finding that the beneficiary posed a danger to himself or others.” In other words, the VA would no longer be able to alert federal authorities that a veteran is mentally unfit to own guns, unless they are able to get a judge to certify it. Currently, professionals at the VA simply make the determination and pass it on to the FBI.

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More guns for suspected terrorists. There are many things that will disqualify you from buying a gun—if you’re a convicted felon, you won’t pass a background check. But if you’re on the federal government’s watch list of terror suspects, you will pass the background check just fine. In 2010, in fact, 247 people suspected of ties to terrorism passed background checks and purchased weapons.


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Stepping on states with tougher laws. The House also passed a bill last fall that would essentially establish a lowest-common-denominator for concealed-carry permits. (It awaits action in the Senate, where in the last Congress, a similar measure sponsored by Senator John Thune was narrowly defeated).


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More guns in public housing. Gun violence is tightly concentrated in poor, urban areas, which makes a bill passed by the House Financial Services Committee in 2009 particularly heinous—a successful amendment to the Section 8 Voucher Reform Act would forbid federal authorities from prohibiting firearm possession in public housing complexes.