Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee’s new legislation to create a national gun registry open to the public, along with a gun licensing regime that requires psychological evaluations before one could legally exercise their Second Amendment rights, isn’t getting much love from gun control groups. Everytown, Brady, Giffords, and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence have all remained quiet since the bill was introduced this week, though every one of those groups has publicly called for these types of restrictions in the past.

The legislation also hasn’t drawn any support from Jackson Lee’s colleagues in the House, at least not as of Friday afternoon. So far the bill has zero cosponsors, though I’m guessing that will probably change before long.

Second Amendment organizations, on the other hand, have been quick to shine a spotlight on the anti-gun legislation. The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (full disclosure: I am an unpaid board member of the organization) and its chairman Alan Gottlieb have taken a look at the legislation, and call it “insanity on steroids.”

“Over the years,” said Gottlieb, “we’ve seen some astonishingly bad legislation originate on Capitol Hill, but this one takes the term ‘abomination’ to an entirely new level. One look at this bill and you wonder whether Congresswoman Jackson Lee ever heard of the Bill of Rights, which includes the Second Amendment.”

“H.R. 127 is a constitutionally-challenged monstrosity,” Gottlieb stated. “It ignores the fact that the Second Amendment protects a fundamental right to keep and bear arms, not some strictly-regulated government privilege. Government cannot require a psychological evaluation to exercise a right enumerated in the Constitution.

“Is it possible Sheila Jackson Lee skipped high school civics,” he wondered. “This legislation treats firearms owners like second-class citizens for exercising their Second Amendment rights. It’s an outrage that a member of Congress could even conceive of such a measure, much less propose that it become law. 

“Instead of subjecting gun owners to such Draconian requirements,” Gottlieb observed, “maybe it’s time to require psychological evaluations of each member of Congress.”

That’s an excellent idea, though I do wonder how many congresscritters would actually pass the screening that Jackson Lee wants to impose on those Americans exercising their Second Amendment rights.

While it may be accurate to call H.R. 127 an insane piece of legislation, the fact remains that President Joe Biden has already embraced the basic ideas that Sheila Jackson Lee is demanding. On Biden’s campaign website you can find his support for firearms registration and gun licensing alongside his gun ban and “buyback” and a host of other anti-gun ideas. Biden has publicly limited his own demand for gun registration to modern sporting rifles and wants to give states grant money to institute their own licensing system, but that’s really just a small step away from Jackon Lee’s proposal.

As crazy as we may think H.R. 127 is, it represents the mainstream point of view of gun control activists. They might not want to publicly praise the bill, but you won’t see any anti-gun organization come out in opposition to it.