The Truth About Suicide and Guns: Read the full report here.
Gun reform advocates have their work cut out for them with this issue, because there are no real regulations in place regarding who can download the blueprints. This means that dangerous people, people with mental instabilities, and people who plan to do physical harm with the weapons can currently do so.
Firearms and components for rifles can now be made at home by anyone with a 3D printer. Ali Velshi and Stephanie Ruhle break down what these 3D-printed guns are and asks the co-president of gun control advocacy group The Brady Campaign, Avery Gardiner, what comes next.
Called “ghost guns” because they lack serial numbers and are made almost entirely of plastic, Mr. Wilson’s blueprints would allow for the mass production of untraceable firearms that could be made at home, gun control advocates have warned, including by convicted felons, terrorists or other people currently prohibited from buying them.
The Trump administration once appeared to back Obama’s stance. In April the U.S. urged dismissal of the company’s lawsuit, highlighting the "potentially devastating" implications of online gun designs getting into the hands of terrorists, according to the Brady Center.
The Brady Center has filed similar civil suits against gun dealers in other states, including one earlier this year against a Newton, Kansas, pawn shop that the group claims negligently sold firearms in a straw purchase that were then "used by a known convicted felon" in the 2016 workplace shooting at Excel Industries near Hesston, Kansas.
“Judge Kavanaugh must tell the American public whether he will protect their most important right — the right to be safe from gun violence — or whether he will cater to the gun lobby’s agenda to let virtually anyone carry any gun, anytime, anywhere,” Jonathan Lowy, vice president of litigation at the Brady Campaign and Center to Prevent Gun Violence, says.
Nearly every Republican received a failing grade—just 17 GOP members of the House and Senate have co-sponsored legislation on any of these fronts. But many Democrats also fell short of the students’ expectations. Only nine of the 49 Democratic senators have co-sponsored all three bills, reinforcing the disconnect that Team ENOUGH had identified between lawmakers’ actions and their rhetoric.
The report was part of a trove of documents recently released to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence after the advocacy group sued the ATF for records. The Brady Campaign shared the reports with The Chronicle.
The Brady Campaign has not yet received all of the reports, but those released to date offer a window into ATF operations, which are heavily guarded by federal laws.
“It’s amazing the creativity and ways they find around our definitions and laws,” said Amanda Wilcox, legislative advocate for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence who was instrumental in passing the new gun registration law. “We have passed and updated our assault weapons law now four times,” said Wilcox. “We have never confiscated the weapons. We have grandfathered them in.”
A group that engages young people on gun-violence issues is releasing a report card that assesses whether members of Congress are co-sponsoring gun-control bills. The group, Team Enough, gives pass, fail or incomplete grades to lawmakers based on whether they co-sponsored one of three bills in the House or four in the Senate.
