Opinion By Andy Massimilian

Letter to the AmmoLand Editor

USA – -(AmmoLand.com)- We hear it all the time. “Universal Background Checks” for all gun transfers are a “reasonable” and “effective” way to stop criminals and the deranged from getting guns. Don’t believe a word of it.

Criminals overwhelmingly get their guns on the black market now and will continue to do so if this law is enacted, and the architects of this backdoor attack on your privacy and civil rights know it.

What’s the real intent of UBCs? Complete surveillance by the Federal Government of every lawful gun transfer.

With UBCs, each transferee– except criminals who always skate the system— will have their name, address, birthdate, race, and other personal data entered into a Federal database through the NICS background check system.

The NICS system started in 1998 for transactions with FFLs. Records of successful checks are supposed to be purged from the system within 24 hours. If the check results in a “delay” response, the subject’s identity is kept in the system for up to 90 days. The identity of those whose checks are denied (even incorrectly) is retained in the system indefinitely. At least that is what is supposed to happen under current law and procedure, but given the abuses that occurred within the IRS, FBI, and ATF during the Obama administration, it’s reasonable to be skeptical that the law is always followed and a backup file does not lurk somewhere within the vast Federal IT bureaucracy.

In fact, records of many gun buyers were retained for “Audit Purposes” during the Clinton Administration until the NRA found out and pressed Congress to put an end to it. Who’s to say that another excuse to retain them won’t be fabricated in the future?

Even if we assume the Feds are all playing by the rules, one thing is certain: if UBCs become law, the Democrats will push hard for Universal Registration using the next mass shooting as the pretense. Some are doing so already. Given every Democratic presidential candidate’s fealty to Mike Bloomberg, many have openly embraced confiscation and UBCs will have enabled that policy by forcing each and every law abiding person who acquires a gun to submit their personal information to the NICS system. Once UBCs are law, all it takes for this “next step” towards their end-game of confiscation is a simple software change and a change of law.

In short, UBCs can create a defacto registration list of legal gun owners, and will easily enable registration of each of their purchases in the future.

When it comes to the gun control mindset, nothing is ever enough and every gun right is a “loophole” right up to and including the Second Amendment. Give them UBCs now, and they will soon be back for much, much more.

But besides confiscation, the consequences for gun owners of eliminating private transactions are disastrous and many. The surveillance of gun owners enabled by UBCs could make a flood of pernicious new laws easily enforceable: purchase limits, waiting periods, licensing, to name a few. An Orwellian nightmare for ordinary Americans, UBCs offer a slice of utopia for statist Democrats who will use them to put every law abiding gun owner under their oppressive thumbs.

And, the sky is the limit on what this oppression will entail. They are even proposals to require gun buyers to buy liability insurance and present the insurance card to the dealer at the time of the UBC. No insurance, no gun!

And if those new laws are not dangerous enough to your liberty, UBCs will create felony traps for harmless transactions between gun owners: keeping a friend’s guns in your safe while he is away on vacation; taking your girlfriend’s gun home to clean it after a match; installing a scope for a friend, borrowing a high end shotgun for a sporting clays fundraiser; bartering your gun to a neighbor for repairs done on your house. For these actions to be legal, you will need to access and almost certainly pay an FFL to process the paperwork and NICS check each time the gun changes hands. And a loaned gun will carry two FFL fees: when it’s loaned and again when it’s returned. If you are unlucky enough to live in NYC or DC, a single transfer can set you back $125, according to John Lott of the Crime Prevention Research Center (https://crimeresearch.org/) who has studied the issue.

Democrats piously proclaim they advocate for “the little guy.” What a crock.

UBCs also exacerbate the consequences of a technical shut down of the NICs system that will derail all FFL transfers. Not realistic? Well, it happened in NJ when a Verizon telecom glitch took the whole system down, and it could easily happen in cases of civil unrest or natural disaster– precisely the occasions when the need for self- protection is at its highest. And what if there’s a government shutdown and Congress doesn’t fund NICS? Then what?

Finally there’s the likelihood that all those transfers will incentivize our political masters to impose or increase fees on background checks. Funding the state with fees imposed on exercising a Constitutional Right have already been proposed in NY and NJ and the ease with which it can be done with UBCs will entice more states to try.

Universal Background Checks create many hidden consequences that seriously diminish your rights. Take action now by calling and writing the President, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and your senators.

Here’s the contact info:

President Donald Trump

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW

Washington DC 20500

White House Comment line: 202-456-1111

Senate phone: 202-224-3121

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