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“The [Nevada] Secretary of State has certified that the petitions submitted for an anti-gun initiative for the 2016 general election ballot are sufficient,” nraila.org reports. “This initiative was filed with the Secretary of State by the anti-gun ‘Nevadans for Background Checks,’ likely affiliated with ex-New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s ‘Everytown for Gun Safety’ and seeks to criminalize most private transfers and mandate background checks for nearly all gun transfers in Nevada, with very limited exceptions.” Here’s the official description from the group behind the push . . .

How The Background Check Initiative Works

The Background Check Initiative will close a loophole in Nevada law by requiring criminal background checks for all gun sales, with reasonable exceptions for family, hunting, and self-defense.

Under The Background Check Initiative, unlicensed sellers will meet their buyers at a licensed gun dealer. Over 97% of Nevadans live within 10 miles of a licensed gun dealer, so this would be easy and convenient.

If the gun dealer agrees to help process the sale, the dealer will conduct a background check on the potential buyer and comply with state and federal law as though transferring the gun from the dealer’s own inventory, except that the dealer will contact the federal National Instant Background Check System instead of the state Central Repository for Nevada Records of Criminal History.

Ninety percent of checks are completed in 90 seconds or less. For those that are not, the seller can take the gun with him or her while the check is being completed, provided the buyer and seller return to the dealer to complete the transfer.

Click here to read the full text of the initiative.

As we’ve pointed out time and time again, any time the government infringes upon (i.e. regulates) any aspect of keeping and bearing arms – Americans’ natural, civil and Constitutional right, bad things happen. At best (worst?), Universal Background Checks are the proverbial camel’s nose in the tent. Anyway . . .

This time ’round, the background check universalists are addressing some of the “practical” issues raised by the poorly-worded, little-loved language of the Washington Initiative (I-594) passed during the mid-term elections.

The Background Check Initiative exempts certain transfers from the background check requirement:

-Transfers by or to a law enforcement agency or a peace officer, security guard, or member of the armed forces acting within the course and scope of his or her employment or official duties;

– Transfers of antique firearms;

– Transfers between immediate family members, which means spouses and domestic partners and any of the following relations, whether by whole or half blood, adoption, or step-relation: parents, children, siblings, grandparents, grandchildren, aunts, uncles, nieces, and nephews.

– Transfers to executors of estates or trusts that occur upon the death of the owner of a gun;

– Temporary transfers for self-defense, hunting and trapping, target-shooting, and organized competitions and performances;

– Temporary transfers that occur exclusively while in the presence of the transferor, provided the transferor has no reason to believe that the transferee is prohibited from having guns or will use the gun in a crime.

Define temporary. Needless to say, the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action is not happy with the Nevada Initiative, seeing it as a bad bad thing.

This incredibly overreaching proposal is substantially similar to legislation considered last year, which was staunchly opposed by the NRA and Second Amendment supporters, as well as the Nevada Sheriff’s and Chief’s Association, which testified against it.  Ultimately, the 2013 legislation was vetoed by Governor Brian Sandoval (R).

This is just another attempt by anti-gun extremists to impose their radical beliefs on law-abiding gun owners in Nevada.  So-called “universal” background checks are ineffective and unenforceable.  They turn traditional innocent conduct into a criminal offense, and are simply ignored and circumvented by criminals.

The battle is joined.

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78 COMMENTS

  1. Well, hopefully the NRA doesn’t screw this one up like Washington. Advertise “NO on *bill number*!” not put an entirely different nonsensical string of numbers that no one will remember and accidently vote wrong.

    • Relying on the NRA when there’s a threatening initiative on the ballot is like dialing 911 when there’s a menacing figure in your backyard. And, no, that’s not a slam against the NRA, or even against the police, for that matter. It’s a slam against YOU!

      Take responsibility for yourselves, your state, and your rights. Organize, get active and defeat this immoral monstrosity of an initiative! Don’t wait for someone to save you and certainly don’t whine when they don’t.

    • That’s a bad play because it leaves no alternative for the low info voter, and it only leaves a negative incentive for POTG to come to the polls.

      First, you should fight the policy based on the odiousness for ordinary citizens. Play ads featuring people using guns for recreation and self defense being harassed by the authorities. Force the enemy to explain exactly how these laws would affect harmless, ordinary folks who just happen to own a firearm. The key is to make these folks as ordinary, appealing and diverse as possible.

      Second, offer a way for private owners to access the NICS (or other) database for free so they can be sure they’re selling or transferring their weapons to a non-prohibited person.

      Third, require anyone transferring or selling weapons to uses run a check, but provide exceptions for temporary use with owner on premises, hunting and family use and use in emergency self-defense situations.

      • I’ll agree with your first suggestion. That’s smart, real smart. The rest, though, while I see where you’re going, is still not the right direction. It’s slow motion surrender, which isn’t made good for being slightly less bad.

      • I’m concerned with the slippery-slope as well, but we’re fighting the long battle, and what we should really be after here is a pivot point to shift the debate away from the antis.

        Throw them a bone in a moot area–as its illegal to transfer a firearm to a prohibited party anyway–while aggressively expanding firearms ownership and awareness liberalizing other laws.

        Come to think if it, our package should also push initiatives that guarantee open carry in Clark County to help get those friendly votes out.

        • If it is already illegal to transfer a firearm to a prohibited person, why do we need another law that can you get you killed? No, I disagree. We don’t give them a bone. We explain clearly, and firmly, that there is already a law and that new law will not likely work when the existing one already fails. I agree with your other points, that we need to send a very clear message that this is already illegal, it will only affect the law abiding, and that isn’t going to be effective because criminals don’t obey laws to begin with.

  2. How about a ballot initiative banning Bloomberg from the state of Nevada. If a majority votes to ban him from the state, he has to abide by it because the voters would have spoken.

      • CORRECT!!!

        His money truck has pulled up and is dumping its load. Just like he said it would. And he will always find Quislings to use it for him.

  3. From Oregon: Fight ’em folks, we all have to do our part to hold the line on these unconstitutional laws! We’ve got the same issues here and we’re expecting a running battle in our legislature this session.

    Notice how the way this initiative is written it requires your gun dealer to used the Federal NICS system instead of your state records for Nevada! They can call it anything they want, this is registration of every gun that changes hands! And we all trust the feds to do what’s right, fair, and constitutional, yeah? Like hell we do!

    Time to get proactive and take the fight to these people that want to enslave us EVEN MORE than we already are. Let’s get our own bills and initiatives going, most Sheriffs will back common sense pro-gun laws. After all, when our sheriffs, God bless ’em, stand against the feds, they will need us behind them, a “Well regulated militia” just like it says in the 2nd amendment. Let the judges try to “interpret” that another way.

    Stay strong!

    • That’s the whole idea. If it doesn’t work as planned, executive orders will add a $100 “fee” to the dealer’s cooperation. Before you know it, no transfers! Ignore the law, repeat “KMA” over and over if asked about it.

      • If they’re going to require us to run a check just to peek at their already-funded database to obey their laws, then the state should bear the full cost. No unfunded mandates, please.

  4. At least it’s written clearer than the washington one. Now washingtonians can’t (legally) shoot each other’s guns on public land…

    Regardless, every single dictatorship/communist/nanny state government has created a gun database, either strong handed or with ‘safety’ background checks and later confiscated all weapons after tooling up the military and police.

    There’s a reason we don’t have a national police force.

    • We Washingtonians can’t shoot each other’s guns period. Even at an “approved range”, the gun has to be stored there at all times, so no sharing of any guns you brought with you.

      • Sure you can. It just would be considered illegal by an unconstitutional law. Laws don’t stop people. Armed men (and women) do.

        • Gun owners in Nevada are afraid of being checked, not of guns. They need to defend themselves against criminals, state-police, Federal police, anti-NRA, communists, socialists, liberals, 2nd amendment offenders and the rest of the world. This heroic fight for gun-rights is pretty unique both historically as world-wide. Nevada is another planet, may be we should just carve it out and send it into space to make it visible you’re truly disconnected from the rest of this world. Hooray for Bloomberg and common sense.

  5. The Nevada legislature approved this ban last year by close margins in both houses. It was vetoed by Gov. Sandoval. I would conclude that there is enough public support for this measure to pass.

    Don’t bet against the house, even when it comes to low-information idiots surrendering their rights. Every slaughterhouse has its Judas Goats.

    • While the legislature did pass the UBC bill that was vetoed by Sandoval, that doesn’t mean it necessary has public support. Both houses switched from Democrat to Republican majorities in the November election. A lot of the Democrat incumbents touted their support of the UBC bill only to find themselves losing their seats. They discovered they didn’t quite have the support of the public that they thought they had.

  6. How about getting a contrary initiative on the ballot. Something like:

    Any firearms sale within the State of Nevada between two citizen residents of Nevada (IE Intrastate Commerce) are determined to be outside of the jurisdiction of the Federal Government and not subject to any Federal restrictions regarding the sale, possession, or use of firearms anywhere within the territorial border of the State of Nevada. Whoever those who have been convicted of violent felony offenses may not own or possess firearms unless authorized, by name, by the governor or legislature,

    and

    At not time may any taxpayer funds, from any branch of government, be used to provide protection or security to Harry Fing Reid.

  7. a) I don’t believe over 90% of NICS checks happen instantaneously like the initiative states
    b) what are the reasonable exceptions for hunting and self-defense? I read the bill. There are no exceptions for hunting or self-defense.

    • I can tell you with certainty that in Clark County, NV, background checks are NOT completed in 90 seconds. They are required to go through LVMPD and they are often backlogged for 30min to an hour, often the gun store calling gets the ‘we are too busy, try calling back’ message. So Much Fun.

      Having your CCW exempts you from having to do this. I don’t see that exemption in the proposal.

      And what is a ‘Temporary transfer for self-defense’? Friend 1 picks up my pistol from my cooling corpse to defend him/herself? I loan it to a friend because someone has been prowling around their house? Talk about ambiguities.

  8. “Over 97% of Nevadans live within 10 miles of a licensed gun dealer, so this would be easy and convenient.”

    So the 3% don’t matter? Tyranny by the majority.

    • The “Over 97% of Nevadans live within 10 miles of a licensed gun dealer” is one of the BIGGEST LIES the I-594 pushed on the uneducated in Washington state. They said things like there were more FFLs in Washington then Starbucks so it should be no problem to get a transfer done anywhere in the state. The problem is all of the big box stores that they counted (ie. Wal-mart, Cabelas, Etc.) WILL NOT do private transfers. But like any of the anti-gun crowd they twist the numbers to paint the picture they want so the uneducated will follow them like sheep.

  9. They tried to get me to sign this garbage. Wanted to rip it out of their hands.
    So add expensive dealer transfers to each private sale.
    I didnt originally see they are gonna run it thru NICS instead of state records which is good in terms of checks since right now we pay $25 each thru the Nevada system.
    The whole bill is trash though.
    Not having to do checks anymore once i got my CCW was very important to me

    • problem is, IMO Nevada has too many jobs to offer, and decent laws for private businesses. I see lots of people moving over I-80 from the hell hole of Sacramento into Reno. then they start to elect the same type of idiots to public office, and there is your problem.

      • Yup. We moved to Reno and found that there are quite a few libs in the area. I encourage my conservative friends to move here to counter the libs. Not sure how much help will be supplied by the NRA/GOA/SAF/CCRKBA etc. Unless some 2nd amendment supporting gazillionaire shows up, nannie bloomers will have his way with help from the moms and the mark and gabby travelin’ puppet show.

  10. If this passes, I will be really concerned. Washington was a pretty liberal state so there was no surprise there. However is this fairly conservative pro gun state goes off the deep end, things will not be looking good.

    • 3 words dude. Harry F’ing Reid. They re-elected that statist SOB, which means they are more than capable of voting for this chain around their neck.

  11. 1. 10 miles and having to pay a third party IS an inconvenience, unless mileage is re-reimbursed, and transfer fee is free.

    2. How do they propose to enforce this legislation?

    3. To make this fair then ALL voters must pay the same amount to vote as a weapons transfer, after all shouldn’t all rights be treated the same– not everyone has a weapon nor does everyone vote!! (this is a snark)

    4. This is not common sense nor does it make sense.

  12. The gun-grabbers in Nevada saw what happened in Washington state so it’s monkey see, monkey do. Headin’ to Olympia tomorrow.

  13. I’ve been saying it people, domino theory. How many times does it need to happen. If they take and hold one state it spreads to another and another. Before you know it we’ll be fighting this in Dixie too. We have to help and support the fights in these states in any way we can, even if it’s just a small donation.

  14. Well if Washington taught us anything, it’s that democracy means being able to buy votes at any level of government. Hooray. :p

    Ah well. Fight the good fight. There’s always hope.

    • Right? They keep voting in these democrats and even brag about it and then wonder why they’re standing in lines to turn in/ register their guns.

  15. So I will fight this measure, despite being a Californian. I won’t sit this one out and say stupid stuff like “you get what you vote for.” I’ve never voted for Reid, or Feinstein, or Pelosi, or Obama. I imagine most of the people here didn’t vote for them. Why would you, if you care about the 2nd Amendment?

    Likewise, I appreciate those who have made steps to support CA gun rights, especially people outside of CA. Unity for gun rights is a good thing. Especially since this anti-gun garbage is contagious.

  16. It’s only reasonable. It’s always “only reasonable” with gun-control folks regardless of what they’re peddling. I strongly suspect, however, that these attempts to control the use and ownership of guns are in direct conflict with the the part of the 2nd amendment that talks about citizens rights to “keep and bear” arms. How can a citizen keep and bear arms if the the state places bureaucratic controls designed to limit citizens’ freedom to keep and bear arms? A literal interpretation of “keep and bear” arms would seem to intentionally expunge the reach of government.

  17. Question is, how do they propose to enforce this? How do they know that a person has not bought the gun from a private party without a BG check?

    • It criminalizes everyone who isn’t on the list. The only way to enforce it is …. Universal registration. If it’s not registered to you – must be an illegal transfer.

  18. Since the stupid UBC bill went into effect in Colorado, all private transfers are supposed to go through a FFL for a background check. That adds a fee from the state of ten bucks, plus whatever the FFL chooses to charge, if they agree to do it at all.

    It’s been a total waste. The legislators pushing it grossly overestimated the amount of private transfers that were done, which means either that not that many private transfers happen, or people are generally ignoring the law. I’d guess some combination of both. The magazine limit law is definitely being ignored.

    However, in the rush by the progs who controlled the legislature at the time (and the spineless governor), common sense and reason somehow got lost in the shuffle-along with the opposition voices.

    http://dailycaller.com/2014/07/29/colorados-experience-soundly-refutes-common-anti-gun-talking-point/

  19. This is very worrisome.
    Though, as pointed out above, how are they going to know?
    And just how long is “temporary”.
    And playing the 7 degrees game, how many times can one transfer it legally, without the registration, before it reaches its intended recipient?

  20. I object to the words ‘temporary transfer’. Letting a friend use you gun isn’t a transfer. They are setting a very bad president with this wording.

  21. Is this the kind of law where you invite a curious Democrat to your house to show him your firearm collection, and then promptly tell him he just committed a very serious crime.

  22. I find it truly sad that states keep doing this. Domino effect? Certain states will resist of course, but isn’t this what the antis want? divide and conquer? Realizing that newtown wasn’t the push they were hoping for at the federal level, they come up with a plan use the tenth amendment at the state level against the second amendment. Then try again at the federal level. Chances of it passing at the federal level suddenly becomes frighteningly real. Bloomie and pals are playing at a longer game friends.

  23. In Oregon, we had the Brady bill in 1994.

    Then we closed the “gun show loophole” in 2000.
    Now they are talking bout closing the “private sale” loophole in 2015.

    In 5 or 10 years, I wouldn’t be surprised to see “close the family loophole” or “close the trust loophole” because 39% of all gun transfers happen between family members. Or some other made up bubble-gum.

  24. This is whys happens when democrats get to a majority in a state. It’s part of the natural process I call, “the liberal nightmare”. Yes, you see some “pro gun” democrats so you get that feeling like everything is going to be ok… But gun control is a party platform and once they have the majority it will be enforced. Make no mistake. Along with gun control you can also say hello to higher taxes, more government intrusion and regulation, emission taxes, and subsequent bans on just about anything.

  25. Was off duty at the local grocery store the Thursday before election day. Guy in the lot told me the petition was to make gun dealers conduct “more thorough background checks.” I told him that the checks conducted by FFLs via a 4473 and DPS did the job adequately. He said he knew of 8 gun shops were he could buy a gun without a background check. I then showed him my police credentials, asked if he was a convicted felony who could not legally possess a firearm, and inquisitively asked to name them so we could investigate his claim. He got really nervous, really fast. I tried to inform him that he had been told to lie to people. The petition required every one to go through a background check and pay fees to sell their private property. But he was backing away at a pretty good clip, don’t think he heard much of what I said. Didn’t see him at that store again.

  26. In Nevada Clark County is the tail that wags the dog. About 80% of the population lives there and it is
    VERY liberal compared to the rest of the state, maybe not quite as bad as some places but CERTAINLY
    not a place one would go to avoid commies and socialists. Doucherocket Bloomberg will almost certainly
    spend MILLIONS in Clark County and he WILL have the help of Dirty Harry Reid and ALL the unions there,
    and there are a LOT of unions representing a LOT of casino employees. And ALL THOSE UNIONS are
    as crooked as a dogs hind leg. So unfortunately there is a VERY good chance that this abomination will pass.

    Whether or not it stands up to legal challenge is another issue but given the track record of the legal system
    and gun rights one would be a fool to assume anything but the worst.

    • A bit of good news though as the water continues to dry up from the mojave wasteland, all the communists in Vegas will begin to abandon it as it returns back into a dessert ghost town. They’ll most likely go back to California were they belong.

  27. The gun grabbers have realized they can only win small battles at the state level, and will continue to seek 100% gun confiscation.

  28. In case nobody has been paying attention, the anti-gun groups are trying to get the same type of initiative in every single state that does not already have one on the ballet for 2016.

    This is their new tactic.

    • But….everyone was ready to put Alan Gottlieb and the Second Amendment Foundations head on a poke when he said this would eventually happen.

      Might start by creating a map of each state with similar initiatives and those that have passed. Because what they could not do at the federal level they will do state by state.

      As far as legal challenge….yeah, you will have to do better than “shall not be infringed” because courts do not care for that as a reason.

      UBC is coming one state at a time.

      • Not for me. I will ignore any such law. And I contend that even attempting to enforce such would cost many trillions before it even gets started, then many more trillions to build the prisons. Sounds tough, civil war is tougher.

        • It’s far cheaper than that. They don’t need to enforce it on every single person who breaks the law today. Enforce ti in a few visible cases, harshest penalties possible, and publicize them widely – and most people will conform out of fear that they will be next.

  29. The time has come to cut blue Clark County loose. Don’t know how they do it down there, but the shows I have been to in Northern Nevada, there are NICS tables set up and “No California Sales” signs.

  30. This is how a police state works. We are all guilty of violating some law, they just haven’t caught us in the act yet.

  31. I used to live in Maryland, a statist land of compulsory background checks for everything and a waiting period for handguns and so called assault weapons. Both laws were routinely violated.

  32. If they want universal background checks then push truly universal background checks. When you obtain your state ID a background check is run the results clearly marked on your drivers license or state ID. Such must be shown when buying a gun or voting.

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