Support No Fly, No Buy Legislation
SUPPORT NO FLY, NO BUY LEGISLATION -- (House of Representatives - July 11, 2005)
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. McCarthy) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mrs. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, last week's tragic events in London reminded us that terrorists can strike anywhere, at any time. We must prepare to prevent any kind of scenario that will allow attacks. Terrorists have proven to be innovative in their methods to kill innocent people. We must work to shut down as many avenues of terror as possible or at least make it more difficult for them to carry out their acts.
But since 9/11, the U.S. has dedicated 90 percent of its domestic preparedness resources to preventing an attack involving commercial air travel. While safe air travel is important, we do not pay attention to other possible scenarios, and it is irresponsible of us to do that. It is time for all of us to be proactive instead of reactive in our homeland security strategy.
One area of homeland security that needs to be reviewed is our pre-9/11 gun laws. Mr. Speaker, we are at war, and our gun laws currently allow our enemies to arm themselves in our country.
At least 44 times in a 4-month period, people whom the FBI suspected of being members of terrorist groups tried to buy guns. In all but nine instances, the purchases were allowed to go through. Affiliation with a terrorist group does not appear on any Federal background check that would disqualify someone from buying a gun.
There certainly have been many more instances of suspected members of terrorist groups trying to buy guns since then, but since the Justice Department destroys background check records after only 24 hours, we will never know. So not only are we allowing suspected terrorists to arm themselves, we are destroying the records indicating how many guns they actually own. We are destroying critical intelligence in this war on terror.
The question my constituents ask me is, why are these people allowed to buy guns in the first place? It defies common sense. We saw what these terrorists are capable of doing just armed with only a box cutter purchased at a hardware store. Then why do we make it so easy for them to be able to buy guns at stores and at gun shows?
The very same people we spend 90 percent of our homeland security funds on to prevent boarding planes can walk into any gun store and purchase an Uzi, AK-47 or a 50 caliber rifle that can shoot down an airplane, whether it is taking off or landing. This is absolutely ridiculous.
Let me set the record straight: I am not trying to take away the right from anyone of being able to buy a gun. These are law-abiding citizens. They have a right to buy a gun. But we do need commonsense gun safety regulations to protect law-abiding gun owners while making it tougher for criminals and certainly terrorists to be able to obtain a gun.
That is why I introduced the No Fly, No Buy bill. Right now, if you are on a terrorist watch list and you cannot board a plane, you are allowed to go into any gun store or go to a gun show and be able to buy a gun. That is ludicrous.
What my bill would do, if you are on a terrorist no fly list, you would not be able to also buy a gun. I understand that mistakes can be made, and on those mistakes, the list that I have chosen that the FBI has, if you are innocent, you will be able to come off that list.
We have to start having a different dialogue on gun violence in this country. But certainly what we learned from London last week, and we do not know if we have terrorists in this country or not, they always wait until we are least suspecting them, we need to do what we can to make sure guns do not get into the wrong hands.
This is not going to take away anyone's right to own a gun, to go hunting, to protect their families. But we can do a better job, especially working in the times that we are working in today.
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