With the impotency of Chicago’s myriad gun controls on full display for the world to see, Gabby Giffords is pushing for the city to add one more: background checks for licensed gun dealers.
In other words, although the city’s “assault weapons” ban, “violence tax,” regulations on handgun purchases, and strict limitations on the number of gun stores–and the locations of those stores–have only weakened the position of law-abiding citizens while strengthening the position of criminals, Giffords wants to put even more gun control on law-abiding citizens via the Gun Dealer Licensing Act (GDLA).
According to ABC 7, the GDLA would “require criminal background checks for gun dealer employees, training and education for gun dealers employees so the background check system can work better, and law enforcement would have the ability to inspect the inventories of licensed gun dealers.” This is classic anti-gun leftism. Gun control is failing, so pass more of it by targeting an already highly regulated group of people–Federal Firearms License holders (FFLs)–who cannot afford to go against the strong arm of the government for fear of losing their license.
Never mind that the entire focus on gun stores is misplaced. Breitbart News previously reported a University of Chicago Crime Lab study that showed that Chicago criminals do not buy their guns from licensed dealers. They do not even buy their guns from the places Democrats like most often to blame: gun shows or the Internet. The Chicago-Tribune quoted Crime Lab co-director Harold Pollack saying the study shows that “some of the pathways [regarding guns] people are concerned about don’t seem so dominant.” He said very few inmates indicated using gun shows or the Internet. Rather, they get the guns in undetectable ways on the street.
Nonetheless, Gabby Giffords wants to go after federally licensed gun dealers in one of the few avenues left open–by going after their employees. And when all the new regulations are said and done, criminals whom the left refuses to incarcerate will still bypass gun stores to buy their guns on the streets.
AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.