By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
UPDATED, 2-4 @ 7:25 a.m. PST–When Joe Biden went to New York City Thursday to, as explained by UPI, “promote a new suite of federal efforts to reduce gun violence in the United States,” a remark from an unidentified “senior administration official” seemed curiously familiar.
According to Fox News, the unidentified official told a reporter, the Justice Department “will work with state and local law enforcement to address the “most significant drivers of violence in each district,” including to “get repeat gun violence offenders off our streets.”
That comment was strongly reminiscent of an effort launched 25 years ago by citizen initiative in Washington State called “Hard Time for Armed Crime.” Championed by Alan Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, the National Rifle Association and local conservative radio announcer John Carlson, the measure passed easily and started taking armed thugs off the street.
At the time, the measure and an earlier campaign supported by the firearms community—“Three Strikes and You’re Out”—were opposed by liberal gun control proponents. “Three Strikes” was even supported by then-President Bill Clinton, and the subsequent “Hard Time” measure got major support from the firearms community.
Biden goes to The Big Apple as the city is mourning the deaths of two police officers, and people are increasingly fearful of going outside of their homes. While some of Biden’s strategies are likely to appeal to beleaguered citizens tired of “defund police” efforts and the subsequent rise in violent crime in many cities, the president’s history of anti-gun politics invariably raises alarms.
The White House released a statement Thursday noting, “The Department of Justice has launched five gun trafficking strike forces, including one in New York City, and it has implemented a nationwide strategy to combat violent crime, which has focused over the past year in taking violent criminals and thousands of crime guns off the streets.”
According to the White House, the Justice Department will do the following:
- Prioritize combating violent crime by directing every U.S. Attorney’s Office nationwide to increase resources dedicated to district-specific violent crime strategies. The Justice Department will work with state and local law enforcement to address the most significant drivers of violence in each district, including to get repeat gun violence offenders off of our streets. New York City’s Gun Violence Strategic Partnership…is one model of the strategies Justice will help expand nationwide.
- Crack down on the “Iron Pipeline” – the illegal flow of guns sold in the south, transported up the East Coast, and found at crime scenes in cities from Baltimore to New York City – and other firearms trafficking by adding personnel and other resources to strengthen the Justice Department’s multijurisdictional task forces that target interstate firearms trafficking.
- Launch a National Ghost Gun Enforcement Initiative, which will train a national cadre of prosecutors and disseminate investigation and prosecution tools to help bring cases against those who use ghost guns to commit crimes.
- Pursue unlawful gun sellers that put firearms in the wrong hands by taking steps such as prioritizing federal prosecutions of those who criminally sell or transfer firearms that are used in violent crimes, including unlicensed dealers who sell guns to criminals without the required background checks.
Curiously, Biden’s gun control scheme announced Thursday did not include the typical wish list tenets such as expanded background checks, so-called “safe storage” requirements or a ban on so-called “assault weapons.”
However, when Biden spoke, he again called on Congress to ban “assault weapons” and original capacity magazines, according to NPR.
Last summer during a CNN Townhall appearance, Biden told the audience he has continued to push for a ban on so-called “assault weapons” and 9mm pistols, the latter an admission he had not previously made.
Ergo, the wariness from grassroots gun rights activists about anything from the Biden administration remotely connected to firearms.
An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that Biden avoided talk of gun and magazine bans.
