State leaders call for gun laws
Cuomo and 11 other governors send letter urging federal action
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and 11 other Democratic governors on Tuesday sent a letter to President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell urging the Republican leaders to pursue stricter federal gun-control measures, even as Trump appears to be backing away from previous expressions of support for expanded background checks.
The governors joining Cuomo are from
California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Michigan, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington.
“Putting an end to the gun violence epidemic is not a Republican or Democratic issue, it is an American issue,” the letter said.
“Public safety is the first and most important responsibility of government, and the failure to act to protect the public is a failure in leadership,” the letter continued. “As governors, it is our responsibility to listen to our communities’ calls for action. However, a patchwork of state laws will never be a substitute for coherent national policy.”
Through the post-newtown, Connecticut SAFE Act and other measures approved in response to repeated mass shootings, New York already has enacted many of the laws at the state level that gun-control advocates are proposing nationally.
New York law already requires background checks on virtually all sales, including at gun shows and online. And last month, a state “red flag” law providing for extreme risk protection orders took effect. It permits law enforcement, family members or school officials to petition judges for orders temporarily removing firearms from those deemed a threat to others or themselves.
In Washington, the Democratic-controlled House passed two gunrelated bills, including universal background checks, in February. They have languished in the Republican-controlled Senate, with Mcconnell refusing to bring up any bill that Trump won’t sign into law.
For his part, Trump has vacillated between an initial declaration, after the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton, that he wants “very meaningful” and “intelligent” background checks, and — after conversations with National Rifle Association leader Wayne Lapierre — a declaration that “we already have strong background checks.” Trump reversed himself in similar fashion last year, promising enhanced background checks after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, only to renege later.
Meanwhile, the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday deliberated on a national risk protection warrant law, as well as on measures to bar guns from those convicted of misdemeanor hate crimes and to regulate large-capacity ammunition magazines and feeding devices.
Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said this week that it was “paramount” for the Senate to pass the House background-check bill in order to “sew up the most egregious loopholes.”
As a House member representing a Brooklyn district in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Schumer was the primary author of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. The law set up the current system of background checks, performed by the FBI on all purchases from federally licensed dealers.
But it excluded transactions between individuals who do not depend on gun sales for their livelihood.
Schumer acknowledged Monday that the exclusion gave rise to what has come to be known as the “gunshow” loophole — allowing individuals to purchase semi-automatic Ar-15-type rifles and other firearms with no background check.
Such sales can take place not only at gun shows, but among neighbors and acquaintances as well as online in certain circumstances.
At the time the Brady bill was signed into law in 1993, “we didn’t know about online so we didn’t focus on that,” Schumer said. “The gun shows in those days were to show off antique guns.”
Schumer’s call for closing the loophole was echoed by freshman Rep. Antonio Delgado, Drhinebeck, who accused President Donald Trump of caving to the influence of the National Rifle Association.
“The president said he was for universal background checks, and then got a phone call, and then after that phone call changed his tune,” Delgado said in a conference call with reporters on Tuesday. “There is not better evidence on who is calling the shots on this issue. It’s not the people.”
Rebecca Fischer, executive director of New Yorkers Against Gun Violence, insisted that recalcitrant Republicans in Washington cannot hold back what she described as a reinvigorated movement for gun control at the national and state level as well as among retailers such as Walmart and Dick’s Sporting Goods.
“It puts pressure on Mcconnell and Trump; they know they’re accountable,” Fischer said. “The consequences will play out in the next election cycle. The tide is turning.”
A Washington POST-ABC News poll on Tuesday found that 86 percent of respondents support “red flag” measures, such as the one New York recently enacted, which allow law enforcement or friends and family to petition courts to have guns temporarily taken from troubled individuals.
And 89 percent support universal background checks, which would be extended to private transactions, including those online and at gun shows.
Both won support from at least 8 in 10 Republicans, white evangelical Christians, and gun-owning households, the poll concluded.
But the National Rifle Association and the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the firearms industry’s main trade group, continue to resist calls for expanded background checks and riskprotection warrants.
Mark Oliva, NSSF spokesman, called the House-passed background-check bill a “nonstarter.”
He said it would put an additional burden on federally licensed gun dealers who are already required to run background checks on their own sales. And, Oliva argued, it would lead to data collection that amounts to a “national gun registry,” which Congress specifically barred in 1986.
“The universal background check legislation that has been proposed is problematic at its foundation,” Oliva said. “It simply cannot work as it is written.”
He added that “red flag” laws could infringe on dueprocess rights of gun owners. “We’re talking about the denial of fundamental rights of Americans,” he said. “There has to be an avenue for an individual to confront and refute unfounded allegations.”