PA Bill Number: HB1472
Title: In primary and election expenses, further providing for reporting by candidate and political committees and other persons and for late contributions ...
Description: In primary and election expenses, further providing for reporting by candidate and political committees and other persons and for late contrib ...
Last Action: Referred to STATE GOVERNMENT
Last Action Date: Apr 22, 2024
Who's Afraid of the Big, Bad, FIX NICS? Are You. . . . :: 12/09/2017
USA – -(Ammoland.com)- Are you afraid of the new Fix NICS H.R. 4477 that was attached to H.R. 38, the National Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act?
If so, why? Look, here’s the deal. Like everyone else who cares about advancing our right to bear arms until we realize our full constitutional guarantee (the Second Amendment recognized as our carry permit, concealed or otherwise), H.R. 38 is probably the single best piece of pro-rights legislation ever voted on in the House of Representatives in my lifetime… even with H.R. 4477 attached.
That said, I’m not willing to send it to the cemetery of other dead bills because some yahoo on a Youtube video, a fundraiser in the form of an email, or comment from someone who saw it an email or on that same dopey Youtube video, tells me something that isn’t true.
Unlike that dope, I’ve actually read the bill and I’ve actually spoken to several attorney’s who have read the bill and have all agreed that it isn’t some anti-gun piece of legislation secretly written by Obama that will add millions of names to the rolls of prohibited purchasers because they missed a credit card payment back in 1982.
Let’s get something straight, right here and now. I don’t like the bill and the reason I don’t like the bill is because we shouldn’t need it in the first place.
I’m not a big fan of writing new law simply to make people comply with the same law that’s already on the books. This fallacy that there is some breakdown in the NICS background check system because the Texas mass killer scumbag was able to buy a gun legally when he shouldn’t have isn’t a breakdown in the NICS system. NO. It’s a breakdown at the Air Force for not doing what they should have done under current law. Got it?
I'm also a realist. H.R. 4477 was going to pass either as a stand-alone bill or attached to H.R. 38, and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it, except, maybe…read it. Upon doing so, I am in complete agreement with the National Rifle Association who has fact-checked Rep. Thomas Massie, a man I admire greatly and someone who has been a guest on my program and found him to be flat out wrong on his analysis of H.R. 4477.
Here’s the text from the NRA ILA:
In a recent Facebook Post, Congressman Thomas Massie (KY-4) included several inaccurate statements about H.R. 4477, the Fix-NICS bill. Below are some facts to set the record straight:
CLAIM: “The bill will also advance former President Obama’s agenda of pressuring every branch of the administration (such as the Veteran’s Administration) to submit thousands of more names to the NICS background check database to deny gun purchases.”
FACT: The bill requires that federal agencies submit the names of anyone who is already prohibited by law from possessing a firearm to the NICS background check database. This differs from former President Obama’s efforts, in which he attempted to administratively create new categories of individuals who were prohibited from possessing a firearm. H.R. 4477, by contrast, is aimed squarely at individuals like the perpetrator of the recent murders in Texas, who should have been reported to NICS because of his disqualifying criminal history.
CLAIM: “The bill is being rammed through, without a hearing, in a very nontransparent process, and it will be passed by attaching it to the popular concealed carry reciprocity bill which already has enough votes to pass on its own.”
FACT: The bill went through a very thorough and public markup session of its own. And like the concealed carry reciprocity bill, the Fix NICS bill would also have enough votes to pass on its own.
CLAIM: “It spends over half a billion dollars to collect more names to include in a list of people who will never be allowed to own a firearm.”
FACT: The bill incentivizes states to transmit the records of individuals who, under current law, are already prohibited from possessing a firearm. It does not create new categories of restriction.
CLAIM: “It compels administrative agencies, not just courts, to adjudicate your second amendment rights.”
FACT: Since 1994, administrative agencies have been required to report individuals who are prohibited under current law from possessing a firearm to NICS. Fix-NICS merely adds additional layers of transparency and accountability to the process, as a well as a new 60-day deadline for the government to resolve claims of records that have been erroneously included in NICS.
Like everyone else, I would have rather seen a clean, stand alone H.R 38 National Concealed Carry Reciprocity bill passed and sent to Trump’s desk, but this bill, even with the “Bump Stock Provision and Fix-NICS attached, is fine by me. Why? Because Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were right when they sang,
You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes you might find
You get what you need..
We need this bill to come out of the Senate and land on Trump’s desk. If you have any questions about this, here’s some advice. Read the bill and relax.
About Mark Walters
Mark Walters is the host of two nationally syndicated radio broadcasts, Armed American Radio and Armed American Radio's Daily Defense with Mark Walters. He is the Second Amendment Foundations 2015 Gun Rights Defender of the Year award recipient and co-author of two books, Lessons from Armed America with Kathy Jackson (Whitefeather Press) and Lessons from UnArmed America with Rob Pincus (Whitefeather Press)
https://www.ammoland.com/2017/12/whos-afraid-big-bad-fix-nics/#axzz50hH9WQSh
