Maryland Delegate Pam Queen (D) is pushing legislation that would require an “embedded tracker” to be added to firearms before they can be transferred in a sale.
Queen’s bill, HB 704, says:
FOR the purpose of prohibiting a person from engaging in a certain bulk firearm transfer unless each firearm that is part of the transfer contains a certain tracker; requiring a seller or other transferor who engages in a bulk firearm transfer to transmit to the Secretary of State Police certain information; providing that a violation of this Act is a civil offense; requiring the Secretary to establish a certain database; and generally relating to tracking technology for firearms.
HB 704 also makes clear that the tracking device is to be embedded in such a way that removing it will destroy the gun’s functionality.
The bill says the tracking device is to be embedded so that it cannot be “removed, disabled, or destroyed without rendering permanently inoperable or destroying the frame or receiver.”
National Shooting Sports Foundation’s general counsel, Larry Keane, commented on Queen’s push to track firearms, saying, “Not only is this a clear invasion of privacy rights and Constitutional protections against illegal search-and-seizure, this is an idea that’s not even technologically possible. This is the stuff of Hollywood — and antigun politicians that don’t understand the first thing about firearms or manufacturing processes.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and a Turning Point USA Ambassador. AWR Hawkins holds a PhD in Military History, with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.