By Dave Workman | Senior Editor
A so-called “universal background check” bill that some observers believe will be fast-tracked has been filed in the Oregon Legislature, and already one newspaper has editorialized against it.
State Sen. Floyd Prozanski introduced Senate Bill 941, a measure that has more chance of passing in the Beaver State this year because the legislature is controlled by Democrats.
Prozanski, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, had reportedly been working on the bill for a while to polish it. But the Albany Democrat-Herald launched something of a preemptive strike with an editorial days before the bill was filed that removed any doubt about where the newspaper stands.
“The problem,” the newspaper said, “is that the proposal likely would not do anything to make Oregonians safer. In fact, another prominent Democrat, House Judiciary Chairman Jeff Barker, a retired Portland police officer, has said he doubts that expanding background checks would have much impact.”
The editorial also asserted that, “Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety group donated $200,000 this past election season to Oregon candidates, with a specific eye on increasing the Democratic majority in the state Senate.”
Bloomberg’s gun control lobbying group invested nearly $3 million to pass Initiative 594 in neighboring Washington last November, including $285,000 out of the billionaire ex-New York mayor’s own pocket.
But language in SB 941 suggests that the authors of Prozanski’s bill learned something from the I-594 campaign. They have added further specifics to language defining “transfers” in the Oregon measure. Under the Oregon bill:
(a) “Transfer” means the delivery of a firearm from a transferor to a transferee, including, but not limited to, the sale, gift, loan or lease of the firearm. “Transfer” does not include the temporary provision of a firearm to a transferee if the transferor has no reason to believe the transferee is prohibited from possessing a firearm or intends to use the firearm in the commission of a crime, and the provision occurs:
(A) At a shooting range, shooting gallery or other area designed for the purpose of target shooting, for use during target practice, a firearms safety or training course or class or a similar lawful activity;
(B) For the purpose of hunting, trapping or target shooting, during the time in which the transferee is engaged in activities related to hunting, trapping or target shooting;
(C) Under circumstances in which the transferee and the firearm are in the presence of the transferor;
(D) To a transferee who is in the business of repairing firearms, for the time during which the firearm is being repaired;
(E) To a transferee who is in the business of making or repairing custom accessories for firearms, for the time during which the accessories are being made or repaired; or
(F) For the purpose of preventing imminent death or serious physical injury, and the provision lasts only as long as is necessary to prevent the death or serious physical injury.
(b) “Transferee” means a person who is not a gun dealer or licensed as a manufacturer or importer under 18 U.S.C. 923 and who intends to receive a firearm from a transferor.
(c) “Transferor” means a person who is not a gun dealer or licensed as a manufacturer or importer under 18 U.S.C. 923 and who intends to deliver a firearm to a transferee.
One issue now at the center of a federal lawsuit against I-594 in Washington is how “transfer” is defined and enforced under the new law. The Second Amendment Foundation and several other entities and individuals filed that legal action on Dec. 30.
Prozanski’s bill was filed on the same day that the Oregon state Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony about another measure that would allow police to disarm people facing restraining orders. According to the Portland Oregonian, Kevin Starrett, executive director of the Oregon Firearms Federation, testified against the measure, calling it “a dangerous expansion to a failed system.”
“We believe taking someone’s rights away when they haven’t been convicted of a crime is wrong,” he reportedly told the committee.
