A 2nd Amendment lobbyist told Fox News Sunday this morning that he doesn’t see “much likelihood that the Congress is going to move on making gun control laws worse than they are.”
“I think it’s a false security to think that somehow we’re going to spot problems when there’s really no way to spot these problems. Some of the most horrendous of the mass murders that have occurred recently, including the one in Newtown would not have been stopped by a background check. The gun is stolen. The person has no prior criminal record,” said Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America.
“We are wasting our time and going in that direction when we should be talking about doing away with the gun-free zones which have been so convenient, such a magnet to those who would come and slaughter lots of people, knowing that there’s nobody that’s going to be legally able to defend themselves in these zones,” he added. “That’s where we’re really making a big mistake.”
Neera Tanden of the Center for American Progress said progressives would rally together to defeat the gun lobby, since “there is something tragically wrong when there is mass slaughter.”
“We need the leadership of the president and I expect the president to play a strong leadership role, but progressive organizations will be working to — working with the states to show that we have the voice and really have the American people,” Tanden said. “And even gun owners who support these proposals, their voices at the table as well.”
“I think the issue here is really not, you know, one extreme versus another. It’s the broad middle, rising up and saying, you know what? We can do something about it,” she added.
Tanden hopes the Biden proposal to be delivered to the president this week includes “ensuring that the federal government, people within the federal government, turn over their records, also, through the background check system. So, you know, the Defense Department needs to do that.”
Pratt called the specter of executive action “just avoiding the reality that we have been moving in the direction that somehow self-defense is not valid.”
“That we can somehow protect ourselves by this background check idea. And, in fact, background checks wouldn’t have stopped most of the last of these mass murders that have occurred,” he said. “The gun gets stolen, the person has no background, that would have popped up, so, we have got to face the reality that we have got to empower average people, including teachers, and other people in schools, to be able to defend themselves.”
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