By Dave Workman | Senior Editor
Two days of emotion-laden hearings before Washington State House and Senate committees regarding an anti-gun initiative revealed that proponents of the 18-page gun control measure, Initiative 594, insist their proposal will help prevent mass shootings and keep guns out of the wrong hands, and they even brought in former Congresswoman Gabrielle “Gabby” Giffords and husband Mark Kelly for added drama.
They just didn’t say how, because when confronted with that question, they could not offer an answer.
Giffords and Kelly appeared before the House Judiciary Committee, with Kelly doing most of the talking. Giffords spoke for less than one minute, urging action on I-594, which is billed ostensibly as a “universal background check” measure. In reality, as members of the Senate Law & Justice Committee learned the following day, it is much more than that, and could actually impact youth hunting, firearms education programs and competition. The Nati0nal Rifle Association has called it a “universal handgun registration scheme.”
Kelly told the House committee that in the years from 2001 to 2010 there were 5,692 gun-related deaths in Washington. Broken down, that is just over 569 fatalities annually, and how many of them were suicides and accidents rather than criminal homicides might be narrowed down by Kelly’s observation that in 2010, there were 93 people murdered with guns in this state.
Giffords, who continues to have trouble speaking more than three years after the near-fatal attack in Tucson that left her with disabilities, told the panel, “We must never stop fighting. Fight, fight, fight.”
Noting that he and his wife are both gun owners, Kelly asserted that expanded background checks would keep guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally unstable, while acknowledging – as did virtually every other witness in support of I-594 – that there is no way to prevent all gun-related crime.
Cheryl Stumbo, a survivor of the July 2006 Jewish Federation attack in Seattle, and sponsor of I-594, described her wounds and recovery in detail during both House and Senate appearances, saying her subsequent surgeries cost $1 million. She contended that this money, paid by the state because she was shot on the job, would have been saved if Washington had background checks on all gun transfers.
Yet Stumbo did not have a direct response when, during the Senate hearing, Republican Sen. Steve O’Ban ran down a list of high-profile shootings in which the gunmen had all bought their firearms at retail and had successfully completed background checks. These incidents included the Aurora movie theater attack, the Cafe Racer attack in Seattle, Virginia Tech, the Washington, D.C. Navy Yard shooting, Tucson and the Jewish Federation. Sandy Hook was a case involving stolen guns, so no background check was conducted.
NRA state liaison Brian Judy told the Senate panel that Sandy Hook was the “Murder your mother loophole,” which raised the ire of Democrat Sen. Jeannie Darneille.
This was after she opened her questioning of Judy and Alan Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms by acknowledging, “I am not a person who handles guns. I don’t own guns. I don’t…they shock me, quite frankly. We’re an open carry state and when I see people open carrying their guns, while it may be perfectly legal, it creates a visceral, personal, physical reaction in me as it does in other people…”
Assistant Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best appeared in uniform during both days of hearings, openly carrying a sidearm. She was there to support the gun control measure.
‘It’s a start’
One of the most revealing statements during the House hearing came from the Rev. Steve Baber from the Skyway Baptist Church near Seattle and co-chair of the Washington Christian Leaders Coalition.
Addressing the committee, Baber stated, “We should act on this 594. It’s just a start. It won’t resolve it. It’s not perfect, but we at least start.”
The following day, Linda Clifton, with the Pacific Anti-Defamation League, urged the adoption of I-594, stating, “Your leadership can set a standard for the country by passing it.”
That is the underlying concern of Evergreen State firearms owners who, like gun owners across the map, are apprehensive about what the “next” step might be. Gun owners in neighboring states are also watching this issue closely because many believe that if the I-594 effort is successful in Washington, it will spread.
Washington gun owners are concerned that passage of I-594 paves the way for a massive gun registry, the likes of which are already being used against gun owners in California and New York, where a generation ago, gun control proponents scoffed at gun owner concerns about registration, calling those concerns paranoid.
However, CCRKBA Legislative Director Joe Waldron noted that “universal background checks are the holy grail of the gun control movement.”
He recalled that several years ago, legislation on background checks has been introduced that might have gotten support from gun owners provided that there was no record-keeping. He noted that the Seattle police chief at the time had balked at the notion because he said the important point was to maintain an “audit trail,” which amounts to a gun registry.
Spokane firearms retailer Robin Ball, proprietor at the Sharp Shooting indoor gun range, noted during her remarks to the House committee, “You really can’t buy a gun on-line without a background check.”
She said passage of the measure would create serious burdens for licensed firearms dealers enlisted to do transfers in private party sales.
“There are a lot of flaws in this that will not stop people from acquiring guns illegally,” Ball cautioned.
And Phil Shave, executive director of the Washington Arms Collectors, which operates the largest gun shows in the state, explained that licensed dealers do background checks at gun shows, as they would anywhere else.
Flawed Data
Over the course of both hearings, several gun control proponents referred to data suggesting that 40 percent of gun transactions are completed without a background check, and nearly 80 percent of firearms used by criminals are now obtained through private transfers.
NRA’s Judy told the Senate panel that the 80 percent figure comes from a Bureau of Justice Statistics report that further detailed where the guns come from: family or acquaintances, or on the street through illicit transactions, none of which would involve a background check because criminals do not bother with such checks.
The 40 percent figure comes from old data dating back before the Brady Law took effect in 1993, and even the Washington Post has given the claim a “three Pinocchio” rating, which translates to meaning that it is bogus. Still, anti-gunners are sticking with it.
Further dissecting the problems with I-594, Judy and retired lobbyist Ed Owens, representing the Hunters Heritage Council, both said language in the initiative could pose real problems for hunters. They asserted that it would prohibit hunting by juveniles on their own, even though that is currently legal in Washington. I-594 supporters insisted this is not the case, stating that they disagree with the analysis.
Owens pointedly told the Senate panel that it doesn’t matter what they think, only what a judge would read in the text of the law.
Initiative 591
There was very little testimony about the opposing measure, Initiative 591, which Gottlieb helped craft. This measure would prohibit government gun confiscations without due process, and also require that all background checks done in the state comply with a uniform national standard.
“Contrary to what you may have heard, read, or even been told, I-591 is not and never has been designed to prevent background checks,” he assured to both committees. “The process should be quick…and without a mountain of bureaucratic red tape or 18 pages of complicated regulations designed to discourage rather than encourage the exercise of a constitutionally protected, fundamental civil right.”
During questioning before the Senate committee, he told the panel that he believes background checks would probably be upheld as constitutional, though he is not convinced it is good public policy.
He crossed verbal swords with anti-gun Democrat Sen. Adam Kline when the senator challenged Gottlieb to ask shooting victim Stumbo “how intrusive the result of an un-checked sale was to her.”
Gottlieb fired right back that “it wasn’t because that sale was checked.
“It did go through a background check,” he reminded Kline, “and it (the shooting) happened anyway.”
That shooting was committed by Naveed Haq who bought two handguns from two different stores in the Tri-Cities area of eastern Washington, even going through the state-mandated waiting period for people who do not possess concealed pistol licenses, before driving to Seattle and committing his crimes.
“You’re setting up a straw man,” Gottlieb told Kline. “It’s not legitimate. It didn’t happen in this case…It appalls me, what happened to her. It’s disgusting, but the thing is, you’re taking away and restricting everybody else’s rights because somebody might misuse something. That’s not the way we do things in the United States.”
Sources in the Legislature have indicated that it is unlikely lawmakers will take any action on either initiative, opting instead to send both to the November ballot, where the voters will decide.
Gun rights advocates, Gottlieb included, are concerned that I-594 backers, who have very deep pockets and the support of former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, can wage a very expensive campaign.
NRA’s Judy even alluded to that during remarks before both House and Senate committees when he questioned why a “handful of millionaires” would want to create a registry of all gun owners.
