Obama Going Around Congress in Gun Control Push

President Obama has shown he has little patience working with that thing called “Congress.” Throughout his presidency, he’s used government agencies to implement his agenda through regulation and with the gun control debate front and center, things won’t be any different. The Hill reported late last week Obama is “quietly moving forward on gun control,” giving federal agencies and authorities even more power when it comes to Second Amendment regulation.

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The president has used his executive powers to bolster the national background check system, jumpstart government research on the causes of gun violence and create a million-dollar ad campaign aimed at safe gun ownership.

The executive steps will give federal law enforcement officials access to more data about guns and their owners, help keep guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill, and lay the groundwork for future legislative efforts.

Obama’s push comes as Harry Reid readies a gun control package for a Senate vote this month and shortly after Dianne Feinstein’s assault weapons ban legislation was shot down by Democrats.

Meanwhile over the weekend, Arizona Senator Jeff Flake said Senator Chuck Schumer’s so-called universal background check legislation, which is actually legislation that criminilizes the private transfer of firearms, is “a bridge too far.

“We do need to strengthen the background check system, but universal background checks, I think, is a bridge too far for most of us,” Mr. Flake said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The paperwork requirements alone would be significant.”

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Senator Lindsay Graham reminded CNN viewers yesterday that those currently violating the law through the current background check system, aren’t being prosecuted.

“This idea that private individuals transferring their weapons and having to go through a background check makes no sense. Before you’d expand a background check, there are 76,000 people last year who failed a background check. And less than 1 percent got prosecuted.”

And as a reminder, Joe Biden said we don’t have time to prosecute those violating the laws already on the books:

During the National Rifle Association’s meeting with Vice President Joe Biden and the White House gun violence task force, the vice president said the Obama administration does not have the time to fully enforce existing gun laws.

Jim Baker, the NRA representative present at the meeting, recalled the vice president’s words during an interview with The Daily Caller: “And to your point, Mr. Baker, regarding the lack of prosecutions on lying on Form 4473s, we simply don’t have the time or manpower to prosecute everybody who lies on a form, that checks a wrong box, that answers a question inaccurately.”

Submitting false information on an ATF Form 4473 — required for the necessary background check to obtain a firearm — is a felony punishable by up to ten years in prison, depending on prior convictions and a judge’s discretion, according to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

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