In March Rep. Robin L. Kelly [D-IL-2] introduced H.R.6318 – Urban Progress Act of 2020. As the short title suggests, it is a massive catch-all full of social engineering. At The Truth About guns, we’re concerned with TITLE III—COMMON SENSE GUN VIOLENCE PREVENTION.
To start, let me describe what Rep. Kelly — bless her heart, she’s not the brightest bulb in the chandelier — is attempting to do. Then we’ll look at what she’s actually doing.
1) She creates a brand new 18 U.S.C. § 932 to make straw purchases illegal and to make it a crime to knowingly transfer or receive a firearm, to a prohibited person or if either party knows the firearm will be used unlawfully. All of this is, of course, already unlawful
2) She requires the Surgeon General to “submit to Congress a report on the effects on public health of gun violence in the United States during the relevant period, and the status of actions taken to address such effects,” so the CDC can generate more anti-gun rights propaganda. To ensure no one tries to stop that, she modifies the Rules of the House of Representatives with a new paragraph.
“(g) A provision prohibiting the use of funds to study the public health effects of gun violence may not be reported in a general appropriation bill and may not be in order in any amendment thereto.”
So she’s trying to short-circuit the Dickey Amendment and provide endless funding for the CDC’s “research.” Under her bill, it would be against House rules to cut it.
3) Kelly adds some new classes of prohibited persons to 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) and (g), such as those convicted of underaged possession of alcohol.
4) The bill incentivizes states to report all those newly prohibited persons to NICS, including those affected by her new definition of “mental defective.” If you ever ended up in court for something like a bit of vandalism committed in a brief fit of rage and were ordered to attend anger management counseling as part of deferred adjudication to avoid conviction, you would automatically become a mental defenctive and a prohibited person.
As a kicker to that:
An individual who has been adjudicated as a mental defective before the effective date described in section 203 may not apply for relief from disability under section 101(c)(2) of the NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 (18 U.S.C. 922 note) on the basis that the individual does not meet the requirements in section 921(a)(36) of title 18, United States Code, as added by subsection (a).
Once “mentally defective,” always “mentally defective.” You can’t ask for relief because you’re better now.
5) Kelly strikes paragraph (s) from 18 U.S.C. § 922, which was largely redundant once NICS became operational. She renumbers (t) to be the new (s), and adds a new paragraph (t) to require…universal background checks, with some exceptions for some loans and transfers between certain family members.
6) Mandatory reporting of lost or stolen firearms within 48 hours of discovering the loss. You would be required to report that to local law enforcement…and to the US Attorney General.
7) Finally, she ends the default proceed after three days exception. That means the FBI can take as long as they want to give you an answer on your background check and you have no recourse.
Take a break. Grab an adult beverage. Because now le’s talk about what Rep. Kelly really did in this bill.
Number 1 was simply a waste of time and electrons, redundantly making an already unlawful act more unlawfuller.
Number 4 is bizarre. It includes this language.
“(B) EXCEPTION.—For purposes of sections 102 and 103, the terms ‘adjudicated as a mental defective’ and ‘committed to a mental institution’ shall have the same meanings as on the day before the date of enactment of the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2018 until the end of the 2-year period beginning on such date of enactment.”.
There was no Fix Gun Checks Act of 2018. I don’t know if Rep. Kelly is referring to the Fix NICS Act of 2018 or to her own “Subtitle D Strengthening Gun Checks Act of 2018.” That title itself is peculiar when you recall that we’re looking at a bill introduced on 03/23/2020. Clearly this was a cut-and-paste job from some other document, but only Kelly knows what.
At step 5, she completely struck 18 U.S.C. § 922(s), and replaced it with what was paragraph (t). And then she added a brand new (t).
Proceeding to number 7, she edits out language from her new (t) that isn’t even in it. That language…
(ii) 3 business days (meaning a day on which State offices are open) have elapsed since the licensee contacted the system, and the system has not notified the licensee that the receipt of a firearm by such other person would violate subsection (g) or (n) of this section; and
…is now 18 U.S.C. § 922(s)(1)(B).
But there are other oddities. Where she modified 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) and (g), she included this.
“(10) in the most recent 10-year period, has been convicted in any court of a crime of violence (as defined in section 16);
Section 16 of what? There is no Section 16 in Chapter 44, where she’s committing her legislative butchery. Better yet, when she refers to the amendment of § 922(g), she actually links to… Document not found, because her URL is
http://uscode.house.gov/quicksearch/get.plx?title=26§ion=922
She attempted to link to 26 U.S.C. § 922, which does not exist in Chapter 44. It’s in the tax code; Requirements of a domestic international sales corporation.
Proposed rights infringement aside, I could almost want this passed as-is, just for the giggles. C-SPAN could livestream video of clerks losing their minds trying to apply the edits to U.S. Code. It would make some great reality TV.