The hard-left Arizona Republic is still bitter that pro-gun Martha McSally won Gabby Gifford’s old congressional seat, and so they’re gleefully attempting to turn guns rights advocates against McSally for supporting the Mental Health and Safe Communities Act by misrepresenting what the legislation does.

Check out this spin:

U.S. Rep. Martha McSally is joining a handful of Republicans daring to touch an issue that has bitterly divided Congress: background checks for gun-buyers.

McSally, R-Ariz., who represents the Tucson-area district where a deranged gunman ended Gabrielle Giffords’ congressional career, says her legislation wouldn’t expand background checks but would improve them, as well as mental-health treatment to reduce gun violence.

A rare alliance has coalesced around the freshman’s bill including politicians on both sides of the aisle, mental-health advocates, law enforcement and even an activist whose late husband was injured in the mass shooting near Tucson.

While McSally’s approach has drawn praise from an array of supporters, it has also drawn rebukes from gun-control advocates including Giffords’ own organization.

“I’m looking for where can we find common ground,” McSally told The Arizona Republic. “We know we have a problem. We have to find good solutions to try and fix it.”

The Republic is doing what it can to push the idea that McSally and other supporters of the House version of Senator Cornyn’s  Mental Health and Safe Communities Act are a “background checks” bill, in order to turn gun right supporters against McSally, and they’ve succeeded in conning a few people.

What the Republic won’t do is tell is why they’re trying so desperately to undermine McSally and the bill.

The MHSCA actually protects Americans from an Obama Adminstration gun control scheme:

Cornyn’s Mental Health and Safe Communities Act (MHSCA) hopes to provide resources to local and state governments to ensure that the dangerously mentally ill who are “prohibited persons” under the law have their records uploaded to NICS faster and more consistently. If such information was uploaded from law enforcement and mental health professionals in a timely manner, some of the nation’s mass shootings might have been prevented. At the very minimum, it would make it more difficult for the truly mentally ill to acquire weapons from FFLs.

In a move that is perhaps even more important based on the number of people affected, MHSCA would also roll-back the Obama Administration assault on the gun rights of veterans and those on social security, as noted by the NRA-ILA, which is strongly backing the bill.

On August 5^th, U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) introduced S. 2002, a bill to protect the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens from continued bureaucratic abuse by the Obama Administration.  As we reported on July 18^th, Obama’s latest gun grabbing ploy was to forward all individuals receiving Social Security Administration (SSA) benefits through a representative payee to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) as “prohibited persons” under federal firearms law.  This is estimated to impact over 4 million Americans.

But this approach is nothing new to Obama bureaucrats.  In fact, stripping Second Amendment rights by administrative fiat has become Obama’s favored tactic in the face of Congress’ refusal to pass gun control.  As we’ve previously reported, the Veterans Administration (VA) was the first to develop an administrative mechanism to forward records to NICS without due process protections in place.  The VA is doing so for those veterans who have a fiduciary assigned to their account.  This is being done without any adjudication or finding that such veterans pose a danger to the community, but simply because they need help managing their financial affairs.

While Obama may relish the ease by which his pencil-pushers can deprive American citizens of constitutional protections, the NRA has pressed Congress for legislation to end this abuse.   Senator Cornyn answered our call by introducing S. 2002, a bill that provides critical protections needed in the face of Obama’s bureaucratic onslaught.

It seems like a no-brainer of a bill to pass for Senate Republicans, based on what it would do for millions being targeted by the Obama Administration via the VA and Social Security alone. The fact that it fills in the gaps in the existing NICS system and make it more difficult for the dangerously mentally ill to acquire firearms is icing on the proverbial cake.

The MHSCA will gut Obama’s ability to undermine the gun rights of millions of American veterans in the VA system, and millions of more Americans drawing Social Security benefits, while ensuring more accurate data is uploaded into NICS to keep prohibited persons from passing a NICS background checks.

The last thing the anti-gun left in this country wants is a NICS background system that works, because that would undermine support for their “universal background checks” (illegal gun registration) scheme they’re so desperately trying to keep alive.

The NRA is a strong supporter of the Cornyn bill in the Senate and the McSally version of the MHSCA in the House.

Pardon me if I trust them more than a reliably left-leaning newspaper.