How Obama Is Sidestepping Congress On Gun Control

constitutionschool.com
March 30, 2013

Photo: Emily Stanchfield.

With a looming gun control vote in the Democratic controlled Senate, scheduled for next month, the Obama Administration is realizing its dream of greater gun control legislation may have been just that – a dream.

The reason being is that whatever bill the Senate puts together, the odds are that Republicans in the House, most of whom have been undeterred by Obama’s Twitter bots harassing their accounts daily, will likely mark the legislation dead on arrival.

Even the Democrats’ top man in the Senate, Harry Reid, recently admitted that even among Democrats in his chamber, the bill probably won’t have enough support to pass.

Still yet, a defiant President Obama is pressing forward with his gun control agenda with or without their help – via executive order.

According to a recent report published by The Hill, “The president has used his executive powers to bolster the national background check system, jump start government research on the causes of gun violence and create a million-dollar ad campaign…”

These steps have enabled federal law enforcement officials to have unprecedented access to many state records, previously locked away from their eyes due to the nation’s longstanding tradition of separation of powers – giving federal agents access to many state records that detail just who in our nation owns a firearm and how many.

Other steps have included eliminating many of the road blocks that presently prevent state governments from notifying the federal government of individuals suspected or deemed to be mentally unstable. This again gives the federal government more power to investigate, restrict and even detain such individuals.

Earlier this month, the DOJ announced a $20 million grant program aimed at incentivizing many of the red states who have previously refused to surrender their records to the NICS database.

“The economy is bad and all governments, state and local, are strapped for cash. Unlike the federal government, states can’t print their own money, so they need revenue badly. The Obama Administration knows this and is dangling a pretty lucrative carrot in front of some of the states hardest hit,” notes one political commentator.

Republicans argue that the President is not interested in merely preventing mass gun violence, as he is maintaining, but rather that he has his eyes set on restricting legal gun owners from fully enjoying their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.

They point to studies the Obama administration has ordered the Consumer Product Safety Commission to conduct, studying whether new trigger lock laws should be implemented.

Vice President Joe Biden said Wednesday the expected upcoming Senate votes on gun control are only the beginning of the White House’s fight.

Presently, the fate of gun control legislation is unclear. A vote on a Senate bill, including expanded background checks and harsher penalties for gun trafficking, is expected next month.

The White House also has been pushing for limits on military style assault weapons and high capacity magazines, but those provisions won’t be part of the Senate bill. Instead they are to be offered as amendments. Admendments that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid believes do not enjoy enough support to pass.

“That doesn’t mean this is the end of the process. This is the beginning of the process,” Biden said during a conference call organized by Mayors Against Illegal Guns pushing for the gun control measures.