While the shooting at Connecticut’s Sandy Hook Elementary School has prompted a national gun control debate, President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder will still push to allow immigrants to purchase firearms more easily.
Normally, the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) requires legal aliens to live in a state for 90 days before buying a gun. The ATF does this through a rule attached to the Gun Control Act of 1968.
In June, Holder’s DOJ proposed to eliminate that 90-day residency requirement rule.
“This rule would finalize the interim final rule published on June 7, 2012 by removing the 90-day State residency requirement for aliens lawfully present in the United States to purchase or acquire a firearm,” the proposal to eliminate that requirement reads in part. “The Department has determined that the Gun Control Act does not permit ATF to impose a regulatory requirement that aliens lawfully present in the United States are subject to a 90-day State residency requirement when such a requirement is not applicable to U.S. citizens.”
The move to allow aliens easier access to firearms is now in its final stages.
The new rule is expected to reach its final stages in April 2013. That means it will either pass or be discarded.
The mass shootings nationwide over the past year, including the one at Sandy Hook elementary school, have not stopped Holder and Obama from pushing to make it easier for aliens to get guns.
While the administration makes it easier for legal aliens to get guns, Obama, Holder, and congressional Democrats have expressed a desire to restrict gun sales to American citizens.
In the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting, Obama has called for the reinstatement of the “Assault Weapons Ban” that President Bill Clinton’s administration passed in the 1990s. The “Assault Weapons Ban” expired during President George W. Bush’s administration.
“Like the majority of Americans, I believe that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to bear arms,” Obama said last week. “It’s encouraging that many gun owners have stepped up this week to say there are steps we can take to prevent more tragedies like the one in Newtown.”
“Here’s what I think we should do,” Obama added. “This week I called on Congress to take up and pass common-sense legislation that has the support of the majority of the American people, including banning the sale of military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition clips, and making sure criminals can’t take advantage of legal loopholes to get their hands on a gun.”