Pro-Second Amendment Republicans in Congress are pushing a bill designed to stop a federally mandated disclosure policy for legal gun buyers many consider racist.
Ever since the new background check policy that took place in 2012, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has required consumers to list their race and ethnicity as part of the application process to legally purchase a gun.
“Why does it make a difference what my race is, as long as I’m a law-abiding citizen?” Rep. Diane Black R-Tenn., told The Hill.
“The government should be color blind on all of our rights, whether it’s the right to religion, or guns, or freedom of speech,” she said.
Black and Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, have introduced the Freedom from Intrusive Regulatory Enforcement of Arbitrary Mandates Act last week to put an end to the invasive government probing.
The ATF maintains it only uses the information for the purposes of identifying someone in a criminal investigation. Similar data has been collected through gun dealers since 1968, but not assembled in an official database, reported the Hill.
“ATF does not, and never has, maintained an archive or other information repository on the race or ethnicity of firearms purchases or licenses, and has no intention to do so in the future,” ATF spokesman Corey Ray said, according to the Hill.
So then, why did the ATF change the application policy?
“It shouldn’t be that you have to distinguish your race to get a gun,” Black said. “They admit they are not doing anything with this information, so why collect it?”
Black and Poe’s bill has growing support from several GOP lawmakers and gun rights groups.
“This is yet another instance of the Obama administration looking to use its executive powers to impede law-abiding citizens from exercising their Second Amendment rights,” NRA spokeswoman Jennifer Baker said.
Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo, who first spotted the 2012 change in policy, wrote a letter to then-ATF Director Todd Jones. “It is disconcerting that the U.S. government is gathering this type of data on citizens when there is no connection between purchasing a firearm and an individual’s race or ethnicity,” he wrote.
Michael Hammond, legislative counsel at Gun Owners of America couldn’t agree more.
“Am I accusing the ATF of racism?” Hammond said.
“You’re absolutely right I am.”
Related:
Ted Cruz takes a shot at Eric Holder during gun-range campaign stop
Uber driver uses newly legalized concealed firearm to stop mass shooting
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