Democrats have reintroduced previously failed proposals representing an exhaustive list of almost all of the gun control bills they have been pushing.
The “Gun Violence Prevention and Community Safety Act of 2023” (Act) has been introduced in Congress each session since at least 2015. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) reintroduced the bill in the Senate on Dec. 6. She wrote on her website that legislation is vital to ending violent crimes committed with guns.
“We’re in a gun violence crisis: 2023 is on track to see the most mass shootings in recent history, and gun violence is now the leading cause of death for children and young people,” Ms. Warren wrote on her webpage. “I’m renewing the push for my comprehensive Gun Violence Prevention and Community Safety Act.”
“It’s painfully obvious that communities of color disproportionately bear the brunt of gun violence in the United States, particularly Black women, who are twice as likely as white women to be fatally shot by an intimate partner,” Mr. Johnson wrote.
According to Mr. Johnson, the bill incorporates the other gun control bills in Congress.
“The Gun Violence Prevention and Community Safety Act incorporates a number of bills,” he wrote on his website.
Ms. Warren’s bill has been referred to the Senate Finance Committee. Mr. Johnson’s bill is in the House Committee on the Judiciary and the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
The proposed law also calls for universal background checks and the elimination of the so-called “Charleston loophole” by requiring a completed background check before a sale’s completion.
The Charleston Loophole refers to the fact that the killer in the June 27, 2015, mass shooting at a church in Charleston, South Carolina, was able to take possession of the rifle he used because the government failed to complete his background check within 72 hours.
That is, the law currently allows a gun dealer to complete a sale if the background check is not done within 72 hours. In theory, it is meant to prevent government officials from dragging their feet on background checks.
It also calls for closing the so-called “gun-show loophole.” There is no gun-show loophole, as all federally licensed firearms dealers must complete a background check through the National Instant Background Check System (NICS) for each sale. Private sales don’t require background checks.
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), speaking against a bill for a similar universal background check in the Senate on Dec. 6, and said the measure would prevent more legal transfers than illegal ones.
“This is about the father who wishes to pass down a hunting rifle to his son or the friend who wants to loan a shotgun to his neighbor who has a need for protection,” he said.
When it comes to gun sales, the law would also increase the minimum age for buying a firearm or ammunition to 21 and set a 7-day waiting period for all firearm sales.
Gun owners would also be required to use a locking device or secure storage when the gun is not in use, and the law would expand the Gun-Free School Zones Act to colleges and universities.
The bill would ban homemade firearms along with certain semi-automatic rifles, so-called “assault weapons,” and would fund a buyback program.
The legislation also increases the authority of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and hires 650 new ATF agents to inspect gun stores. It would also establish an electronic database of ATF records.
The bill would also make it easier to sue gun manufacturers for the misuse of their products by criminals by weakening the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act and giving the Consumer Products Safety Commission the power to regulate the firearms industry.
The proposed law includes a 30 percent tax on all firearm sales and a 50 percent tax on all ammunition sales. The taxes would fund $120 million to be split between the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the U.S. Department of Justice to pay for research into “gun violence.”
Currently, the government is not allowed to fund research that could result in infringement on a Constitutional right.
The taxes would also fund grants for community-based violence intervention programs.
Gun rights advocates say the bill is likely to get no traction. However, it exposes the true motives of the gun control lobby, they say.
“Senator Warren’s bill is a laundry list of unconstitutional liberal gun control fantasies. The so-called ‘Gun Violence Prevention and Community Safety Act of 2023’ only serves to disarm and restrict the ability of good citizens in communities across the nation to protect themselves from criminal gun violence,” Dudley Brown, president of the National Association for Gun Rights wrote in an email to The Epoch Times.
