I've been following the pending Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on commerce in firearms scheduled for Sept. 14 and speculating on the purpose in the absence of "official" word. In my earlier report today, I linked to NRA-ILA's release concerning regulatory reforms for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
I just received the following by email from a Senate press secretary who chooses not to be identified for attribution:
"I have some background information I can provide to you – background, as I said, only. This means for general information, and not for direct attribution. It is meant as guidance as to the broad scope of the hearing.
"FOR BACKGROUND PURPOSES ONLY:
"The Judiciary Committee notices hearings one week in advance, and often times, witness lists are noticed a few days later. We are still working to finalize the witness list for this hearing, and once that is finalized, we will notice it on our website. http://judiciary.senate.gov/hearings/hearing.cfm?id=4771
"This hearing is intended to examine the BATFE's practices for enforcing Federal laws against federally licensed firearms sellers and proposed legislation to make reforms and improvements to that system.
"The hearing will look at S.941, legislation proposed by Senator Mike Crapo, of which Senator Leahy is a cosponsor along with a bipartisan group of 34 other Senators. The legislation is intended to improve the regulatory process for federally licensed dealers by, among other provisions, instituting a graduated penalty system, providing expanded administrative and judicial review of agency sanctions and revocations, and directing the Attorney General to produce investigative guidelines for the BATFE. "
I wonder if they'll also bring up stuff about perjury, agent complaints of corruption and incompetence, and erroneous firearm transfer records?
Also see:
"Senate committee to hold firearms in commerce hearings-why is information so scarce?"
Comments
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David,
I’m starting to believe this ‘hearing’ is just political posturing. S 941 was introduced April 30, 2009. Well over a year ago. It was referred to committee the same day and hasn’t moved since.
They have left it very late to start pushing this now. What with the upcoming elections, holiday recesses, campaigning for re-election, I just don’t think there is time enough for this to go anywhere.
Also, the end of this session of Congress (111th) marks the end to the 111th Congress. All bills still in committee or has not passed the floor will die.
I posted this on the previous story and then saw this story so I'll repost.
I've been buried with other things the past couple of days and didn't realize this was causing such a stir.
The hearing is expected to be a normal hearing on S.941 and if anything comes out of it I expect it to be a bone to the industry in the form of support for the bill and possible fast-tracking for passage.
S.941 is a very detailed and carefully written bill primarily addressing punitive options ATF has for addressing FFL errors and omissions. As things stand, ATF can either revoke the FFL or they can give a warning - nothing in between. S.941 gives them some fines and such which they can impose (with very strict limitations to minimize abuse) as an alternative to revoking a license.
This bill is supported by the NSSF and NRA and ATF. While I was very skeptical about it, I can't find anything particularly objectionable about it.
The only people opposing the bill are Brady and VPC and their objections seem to lie in the fact that NRA and NSSF support it.
I think it is quite possible that this bill could be fast-tracked and passed as a "what have we done for you lately" show-piece for the Dems. "See, we just passed this pro-gun bill supported by NRA and NSSF! We're not so bad!"
I think the chances of this being used for sneaky anti-gun back-stabbing are extremely slim.
Jeff Knox, www.FirearmsCoalition.org
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