GAO gun trafficking report appears agenda-driven

June 18, 4:42 PMGun Rights ExaminerDavid Codrea

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The GAO gun trafficking report I referenced earlier today has been posted to their website. I present it here for your convenience. United States Government Accountability Office Report to Congressional Requesters

I have not had time to read the entire document, nor to analyze it. I expect the experts to begin weighing in immediately, and national gun organizations will no doubt release position statements soon. In the mean time, read the report for yourself. Notable highlights from first glance:

"Over 90 percent of the firearms seized in Mexico and traced over the last 3 years have come from the United States."

Which, as we've seen repeatedly, is a woefully incomplete data set to extrapolate from.

While the eTrace data only represents data from gun trace requests submitted from seizures in Mexico and not all the guns seized, it is currently the only systematic data available...

Again, they're admitting their findings are incomplete, but they intend to draw conclusions anyway. Why?

ATF officials stated certain provisions of some federal firearms laws present challenges to their efforts to combat arms trafficking to Mexico. For example, they identified key challenges related to (1) restrictions on collecting and reporting information on firearms purchases, (2) a lack of required background checks for private firearms sales, and (3) limitations on reporting requirements for multiple sales.

So they can gin up the hysteria to enact complete registration and end private sales.

I and others will no doubt have much more to say about this later. Let me end this post by noting it ironic, and more than a little Orwellian, that the agency tasked with ensuring government accountability to the citizens through their Congressional representatives says the way to do that is by making citizens more accountable to the government.

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