A win for safety
Rep. Mike Thompson, DSt. Helena, is a gun owner, a hunter and a defender of Second Amendment rights. He also is a firm believer that he and other responsible gun owners have nothing to fear from background checks that keep firearms out of the hands of felons and others who pose an established threat to public safety.
He’s also patient and persistent.
For years, Thompson has championed legislation to close giant loopholes in federal background checks, encountering resistance from the disinformation campaigns of the gun lobby and the timidity of politicians unwilling to stand up to those interest groups even though polls show that upward of 90% of Americans support such sensible controls.
Thompson’s backgroundcheck bill, HR8, passed a significant milestone Thursday when the House voted 227203 to advance it to the Senate. It would prohibit anyone but a licensed firearms importer, manufacturer or dealer from transferring a firearm to an unlicensed individual without a background check.
In his pitch on the House floor, Thompson took on the gunlobby disinformation, point by point. HR8 does not create a national gun registry; it explicitly forbids one. It does not prevent someone from giving a gun to a family member or lend a gun to a friend to go hunting — both are allowed.
What it does prevent are unvetted purchases at gun shows, online or in persontoperson deals.
“We know that universal background checks work,” Thompson said, explaining that “every day” the existing laws stop 160 felons and 50 domestic abusers from obtaining a deadly weapon.
It’s long past time to close the loopholes that make it so easy for criminals to bypass a background check. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, among the legislators who wore orange in solidarity with the gunsafety movement, called the gun violence crisis “a challenge to the conscience of our country — one that demands that we act.”
Despite Thursday’s House vote, which included eight Republicans, HR8 will not be an easy lift in the 5050 Senate. It had cleared the House in 2019, after the Parkland, Fla., high school massacre of 17 intensified public outrage, but thenMajority Leader Mitch McConnell, RKy., never let it reach a floor vote.
It raises the perennial question: How much carnage will it take for the Senate to adopt even the most reasonable of gun regulations?
A second bill to clear the House on Thursday, HR1446 by Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, DS.C., would extend the review period for an initial FBI background check from three to 10 days. The current time frame has been called the “Charleston loophole” because its expiration allowed white supremacist Dylann Roof to purchase a handgun that was used in the killing of nine people at a historically Black church in Charleston, S.C.
That bill passed the House, 219210, without a single Republican in support.
Each measure needs to become law. Senators, take a stand for public safety over the fear and lies that have prevailed for too long.