Assembly passes bills aimed at reducing gun violence
ALBANY, N.Y. » The Democrat-controlled state Assembly on Tuesday passed legislation aimed at reducing gun violence in the state, a day after Republicans who control New York’s Senate approved bills that focus on school safety but don’t address the gun control issue.
Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said the majority’s five-bill package approved Tuesday is another example of New York serving as “a national model for sensible gun laws” in the aftermath of mass shootings in the U.S.
“Wewill continue fighting to ensure that we have the strongest and smartest gun laws possible to keep citizens and communities safe,” said Heastie, a Bronx Democrat.
The Assembly measures would keep firearms out of the hands of people deemed by courts to be a danger to themselves or others, set a 10-day waiting period for delivery of a gun to a person whohasn’t cleared a background check instead of the current three-day period, and prevent people convicted of domestic violence from buying a firearm.
The bills also would ban the devices known as bump stocks, which can be used to increase the firing speed of semi-automatic rifles, and require out-of-state residents who also have homes in New York to waive the confidentiality of their home state’s mental illness records if they want to own a gun in New York state.
None of the Assembly measures involve school security, but Heastie and other supporters of the legislation say the bills would keep firearms from getting into the hands of people intent on doing harm at a New York school.
On Monday, Republican senators who hold the Senate majority with the help of a group of breakaway Democrats passed 15 bills involving school safety. The measures include state funding for armed police stationed in schools and other security upgrades. The Republicans turned back efforts by
Democrats to advance new restrictions on firearm access.
The Legislature’s actions come in response to last month’s mass shooting at a Parkland, Florida, high school that left 17 students and educators dead. While Senate Republicans support having an armed police presence in schools, Assembly Democrats remain staunchly against the idea.
“Having an armed security person didn’t prevent what happened in Florida,” Heastie said.
The Assembly’s measure regarding domestic violence convictions and guns is similar to a proposal Gov. Andrew Cuomo unveiled as part of his 2018 agenda. The Democrat says anyone convicted of a domestic violence crime would have to surrender any firearms they possess. Cuomo has said it should be up to Congress to pass any meaningful guncontrol legislation.
Whenasked if he expects the Assembly’s anti-gun violence measures to be part of the negotiations over Cuomo’s $168 billion state budget proposal, Heastie responded: “This should be a top priority as a stand-alone issue.”
In Washington, meanwhile, the Republican-controlled House will vote on a school safety bill next week.
House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Tuesday the House will take up a bill creating a federal grant program to train students, teachers and school officials how to identify and intervene early when signs of violence arise. The bill would implement federal schoolthreat assessment protocols designed to prevent school shootings.
If approved, the STOP School Violence Act of 2018 would be the first gun-related action in Congress since the Feb. 14 attack on the Florida high school that left 17 dead.
The bill’s sponsors, Rep. John Rutherford, R-Fla., said the bill could help officials prevent school shootings.
“The best way to keep our students and teachers safe is to prevent violence from ever entering school grounds,” said Rutherford, a former Jacksonville sheriff.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, RUtah, has sponsored a similar bill in the Senate, although senators are expected to turn first to a bill strengthening the federal background checks system for gun purchases.
No votes on gun bills are scheduled in the Senate.
Texas Sen. John Cornyn, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate and the lead sponsor of the background checks bill, said Tuesday he is frustrated that lawmakers keep attempting to add gun-related proposals to his bill, a relatively modest measure that would bolster the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
The “Fix NICS” bill would penalize federal agencies that don’t properly report required records and reward states that comply by providing them with federal grant preferences. The bill is a response to a shooting last November in which a gunman killed more than two dozen people at a Texas church. The Air Force has acknowledged it failed to report the gunman’s domestic violence conviction to the National Criminal Information Center database.
“People want to make this bill a Christmas tree, trying to decorate it with other legislative ornaments that look nice to their political base but stand no chance of passing this body or the House,” Cornyn said on the Senate floor. “I think we have to call that what it is. It’s political posturing. It’s not about getting a result.
“It’s not about passing a bill which will actually improve the background check system.”
Fix NICS has passed the House, and President Donald Trump has indicated he would sign it, Cornyn said, citing a phone conversation with Trump last Thursday. The call came a day after Trump put Cornyn and other Republicans in the hot seat as he called for speedy and substantial changes to the nation’s gun laws in a televised meeting with a bipartisan group of lawmakers at the White House.
Trump later appeared to back away from some of the proposals to tighten gun laws, saying in a tweet that “Many ideas, some good & some not so good” were discussed. Trump also tweeted that he’d had a “Good (Great) meeting in the Oval Office” the next night with the National Rifle Association, which opposes many of the proposals discussed at the Feb. 28 White House meeting with lawmakers.