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Tuesday, August 7, 2012

CQ Roll Call Daily Briefing Gets it Wrong on HR822

Today's CQ Roll Call Daily Briefing gets it wrong when discussing the Tucson shooter who was in court today.  Writing about his date to convince a judge that he is now sane and can plead guilty to the shooting of Gabby Giffords, her House successor Ron Barber and 17 others, including a federal judge, Roll Call decided to do more than just discuss the proceedings and delve into how the shooter could have carried his firearms concealed into any state under HR 822, The National Right to Carry Reciprocity Bill.  In doing so, they got it wrong:
Loughner had purchased the Glock 19 semiautomatic handgun he used two months before the shooting at a Tucson weapons store, passing the instant background check required by federal law. Under Arizona’s especially lenient gun control laws, he was allowed to conceal and carry the pistol without a permit; under legislation passed by the House and being pushed by the NRA in the Senate, he could have cited that state law as permission for him to hide the piece anywhere in the country.
Note CQ Roll Call takes a shot at Arizona's gun laws by editorializing that they are "especially lenient."  They also repeat one of the myths about HR 822 - that if passed, the bill would override a state's laws related to concealed carry.  Here are the facts related to HR 822 and how it would affect citizens from states that allow carrying without a permit to carry in permit states (emphasis added):
Amends the federal criminal code to authorize a person who is carrying a valid, government-issued identification document containing that person's photograph and a valid permit to carry a concealed firearm in one state, and who is not prohibited from possessing, transporting, shipping, or receiving a firearm under federal law, to possess or carry a concealed handgun (other than a machine gun or destructive device) in another state in accordance with the restrictions of that state.
In other words, in order for a Vermont resident, or resident from any state (i.e. Arizona, Alaska, Wyoming) that does not require a permit, to carry in Virginia or any other state that requires a permit to carry concealed, they would either need to get a Virginia out of state permit or any other state that issues a permit to out of state residents.  The Tucson shooter could not have carried in any other state that requires a permit under H.R. 822 if he did not have a permit.

For those in the pro-rights community who may read this and support a different version of the reciprocity bill because it does not require an individual from a Arizona, Alaska, Wyoming, and Vermont, to get a permit to carry out of state; the point of this post was not to debate the differing versions of the reciprocity bills, but to point out that Roll Call got it wrong related to the NRA backed bill.

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