President Joe Biden has worked in tandem with gun control advocacy organizations seeking to disarm law-abiding American citizens and demonize American firearm manufacturers. While this connection between the Biden administration and gun confiscation supporters is well known, the Department of Justice has threatened to undermine that relationship by daring to recognize the indisputable truth that criminals are responsible for the crimes they commit.

At the same time, President Biden’s Justice Department is conveniently ignoring initiatives led by the firearms and ammunition industry that are proven to prevent gun crimes and keep communities safer.

In 2021, U.S. District Court Judge Xavier Rodriguez found the U.S. government 60 percent liable for the 2017 Sutherland Springs attack, during which the perpetrator murdered 26 individuals and wounded 22 more at the First Baptist Church in Texas. In the lawsuit that followed, Holcombe v. USA, Judge Rodriguez stated that the U.S. government was primarily responsible for the incident because the Air Force failed to report to the National Instant Criminals Background Check System (NICS) murderer’s 2012 domestic violence court-martail conviction, his dishonorable discharge and his involuntary commitment to a mental health facility, awarding a $230 million judgment to the plaintiffs.

As a result, between 2012 and 2017, the perpetrator was able to make multiple firearm purchases from firearm retailers.

Responsibility

No one – not even the government – disputes that the Air Force failed to report material information to NICS that would have disqualified the murderer from legally purchasing firearms. In its recent appeal of the 2021 court decision, the DOJ called the attack an “inexpressible tragedy,” adding that it “unequivocally does not seek to excuse” the government’s failure to report the murderer’s criminal and mental health history.

However, the Department’s civil division contends: “Even if the government’s conduct might have contributed to the sequence of events… the man who pulled the trigger that day cannot bear less than half of the responsibility for causing the injuries and pain of the victims and their families.”

For once, the Biden administration correctly recognizes that criminals are responsible for their crimes, even if this admission is under the duress of the looming $230 million settlement the government owes the victims of Sutherland in adherence to the 2022 ruling they are now appealing.

To be sure, attributing blame where blame is due and fixing persistent bureaucratic problems that failed to prevent a violent and mentally ill individual from acquiring a firearm when he should not have been able to are not mutually exclusive. Indeed, the firearm industry has wholeheartedly supported and in fact spearheaded initiatives intended to stop violent individuals from gaining access firearms.

Action

In the wake of the Sutherland Springs tragedy, the NSSF advocated for legislation that made background checks stronger, more comprehensive and increasingly thorough. NSSF’s consistent efforts to strengthen NICS culminated in the Fix NICS Act of 2018, which removed obstacles to the proper submission of mental health and criminal records. Obstacles that would have, and in the case of Sutherland Springs in fact did, impede the system’s proper functioning.

Specifically, the Act created incentive structures for states (to the extent legally possible under federal law) to improve their reporting and compels federal agencies to report material information to NICS that would make gun sales to specific individuals illegal, to close loopholes, and prevent violent individuals from accessing firearms. It is difficult to overstate what a dramatic, positive impact this has had on public safety.

Before Fix NICS legislation passed Congress, a Department of Defense Inspector General report detailed that “31 percent of records were not submitted (to NICS) as required.” Between April 2018 and August 2019, however, a DOJ report on the effectiveness of the Fix NICS Act showed “an increase of over 6 million records in the three national databases searched with every NICS check — a 6.2 percent increase. In addition, there was a 15 percent increase in records in one of those databases, the NICS Indices.”

As gun control advocates push for unrealistic and poorly conceived legislation that targets law-abiding Americans, the success of Fix NICS shows the firearm and ammunition industry is committed to finding Real Solutions® to prevent gun crime by deranged individuals and criminals.

NSSF and its partners in the firearm industry remain committed to protecting the Second Amendment rights of American citizens while working to ensure that dangerous, violent perpetrators can’t purchase firearms – whether through firearm retailers, straw purchases, or any other black market transaction – thanks to the NICS platform and its improvements via Fix NICS. We encourage the Biden administration to develop a more consistent, coherent, and logical approach to gun crimes that reflects the primary truth in the Department of Justice’s arguments: that a robust background check system is operational and that criminals are deemed responsible for their crimes.

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31 COMMENTS

  1. Criminals commit crimes and are the ones responsible for them and not millions of law abiding gun owners! Gasp!

    Next article up: “Snow ball fight in hell, Satan says ‘I’m not sure what happened.’ Biden blames million of law abiding gun owners and proposes legislation to ban snow.”

    • I mean choices are accept reality or pay hundreds of millions to families they were partially responsible for harming……….yeah that’s a tough one for government.

  2. “pay hundreds of millions to… “

    Hillary is getting just $1 million with this ruling but that’s a start!

    “A federal judge on Thursday ordered former U.S. President Donald Trump and his attorneys to pay more than $937,000 in sanctions for suing former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over claims the 2016 presidential election was rigged.

    U.S. District Judge John Middlebrooks, who threw out Trump’s lawsuit in September, said the sanctions were warranted because the former president had exhibited a pattern of misusing the courts to further his political agenda.

    “This case should never have been brought. Its inadequacy as a legal claim was evident from the start. No reasonable lawyer would have filed it. Intended for a political purpose, none of the counts of the amended complaint stated a cognizable legal claim,” Middlebrooks wrote in the 45-page written ruling.”

    https://www.reuters.com/legal/trump-lawyers-sanctioned-nearly-1-million-political-lawsuit-vs-clinton-2023-01-20/

    • gee whiz…individual held responsible for what they did.. Miner49er finally agrees that people be held responsible for their actions and not millions of law abiding gun owners he previously wanted to hold responsible for things they did not do.

      • .40 cal,

        So, when do Barry Soetoro and Eric “Wingman” Holder get fined? We know for a fact they provided the gun that killed at least one Border Patrol agent.

      • Just another miner double standard. It’s all he has. But the soros money feels good in his pocket.

    • MINOR Miner49er Are you brain dead or just stupid? I’m betting a bit of both. Seems Hillary will get nothing. Her attorneys will.

  3. Gun Controllers don’t care that criminals commit crimes. They don’t want YOU owning guns… because they say so. At their core, not only do the elites despise you, they’re afraid of you.

    This whole gun control argument has nothing to do with effectively controlling crime. The elites really believe that completely disarming the civilian populace will result in a perfect society and they won’t stop until they achieve their goal. It’s like a religious tenet for them.

    • Ticked Off,

      “It’s like a religious tenet for them.”

      Absolutely!!

      Amen!! Hallelujah before they sock it to ya!

  4. Hmmm…..what if we abolish NICS? No background checks…none. Would crime go sky- high? Would the streets run red? Would the deep-blue cities become even more uninhabitable? Would Mike Bloomberg get even shorter?

  5. This should be another awesome piece of case law that can be used in future law suits against armed citizenry and the people that supply them. Imagine Garland filing lawsuit against a gun maker and them using their own filings to tell them what’s what.

  6. Fix NICS?

    The gun control Mafia welcomes the aid in solidifying control over non-criminal gun owners, and appreciates the lack of attention to the fact that criminal use of fireams almost always evades detection until someone is shot.

    Not mentioned is that “mental health” is highly subjective, and can be stretched (a’la government abuse) to include someone who has trouble understanding the federal tax code.

  7. Simplest solution would be put the violent criminals in prison if and when they are caught, and drop the dumb, useless crap. Sorry folks but anyone who knows they are not eligible to own a firearm will not get their firearm from the local gun shop. They get them on the street as they have for the last century.
    Gun control has nothing to do with safety, preventing crime, or somehow keeping firearms out of the “wrong” hands. But has everything to do with government control of the non criminal, law abiding population.

  8. Full Stop.
    First we bitch NICS is bullshit .
    Then we applaud NICS stopping the purchase of gunms.
    So what is it? Cake and eat it too.
    Or, I dont own an Ox.

  9. …Bought an AR 01/16, some ammo, (a little mixed fruit pudding of Home D, target and a bitchin’ optic yes ANOTHER AR, she was just too awesome to pass up). ..waited around having coffee with the shoppe owner for Clearance to take home my toyz, 45 minutes later got an answer, DELAYED….It’s now FRIDAY night, soon to be saturday morning and no word from the Fed’s…nice, MAYBE THEY WORK WEEKENDS…YEAH RIGHT! I have a CCW, Level 3 Lic. and work for a reputable Security Firm…VETTED up the ASSSSSSSS many times, $300 PSYKE EVAL, i MUST BE A NO GOODNICK skell!! 3 months ago I bought a .357 Revolver and got the Okeedokee in 15 minutes,,,,, Magnum OK-AR Not! WTF! This whole system is broken. Why delayed? because it’s an AR? Because I am a White male? maybe because I drive a Black truck and have a GERMAN Shepard? Who the hell knows anymore? My record/history is spotless. Yesterday, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (don’t get me started on that!) ( Dimigod NM) announced a full court press of the upcoming legislative session: “9 round mag’s and no more, everything larger and you are an Instant Felon. More intensive background checks ( how much more can they crawl up our azzez ????, New infringments, unconstitutional laws yadda, yadda,yadda all Dims ( like (7) of them) some multiple anti-guns bills each doing their best to get their names “In the books on how tough the are on crime/criminals “. (9) round mags don’t exist you A-Holes! We would be the only state in the friggin’ country w/ a (9) round limit, My duty gun holds (17)! is S&W gonna come up w/ a new mag Just for us? is Glock? Um, let me think?, NOT! I am not ALLOWED to use my Revolver because it looks too SCARY to the Guvment workers I protect! I already can’t wear my (3) sets of body armor I have because I would look too MILITANT!! WHAT? I have to be issued a concealable Body armor that won’t scare the WOKE/ Vaxed/boosted masses that crime is everywhere! ( 6 months,still waiting folks!) Holy CHRIST this is just getting too STUPID to believe. But I can probably pack grenades! I wouldn’t put it past them guy’s. We PoTG’s are the CRIMINALS in these Woke morons eyes!!!!! and the Illegals…oh sorry “migrants and the opressed” are floodding across New Mexico/Texas,Californacation and Arizona boarders ! Mental patients, Prison release Felons, Terrorist’s of all flavors are swarming Albuquerque and these boarder states and the worthless Pol’s do NOTHING about it! WE DON’T HAVE AN OPEN BOARDER say’s Mensa boy… Right! We are filling up our hotels and calling them “WELLNESS CENTERS” and our Vet’s are outside sleeping on cardboard beds! What’s next for US? Bid-a-wee is going to supply these river rats w/ weapoms? because Albuturkey is getting too dangerous????? Why the hell not. Maybe I will be forced to give them rides in my Corvette! (No friggin’ way jose!) Mine is the same color and year as or frettful leader! Wouldn’t suprise me one bit. A guy in Chiraq shoots another upstanding citizen 14 rounds expended/ 3 to the noggin’ and the soro’s backed DA called it self defense! also hit a passenger in a city bus in the hand minding her own biz-ness, just another casualty of war I guess. Was he just a misunderstood Yoot! His mugshot tells me he musta been validik-toriyan of Pelican bay!! His lawyer said the gun wasn’t his! No it wasn’t, HE STOLE IT Probably! Our Founding Fathers must be spinnin’ in their graves over how bizarre this country is getting! You can’t make this stuff up! Lastly we spend Quadrillions supplying cabal based Yuckraine with our best Weapoms! Why? Depleating our own stores in the process… Why? so the Chi-coms can roll down Cenral ave. with their tanks unopposed, we’ ll probably give ’em out gas too! Does anybody else here NOT believe the gubment is in bed with SATAN? C’mon folks we are gonna be fightin’t for our lives before June ’23. I probably only stay sane because I am too stubborn, angry and just plain patroitic to roll over and give up. I read this site and others to just hear similar comments and frustrations to prove to myself that I am not alone and a raving lunatic like our dik-lis wonders who troll us here.(couldn’t resist! 😁). I hear “Arm up and carry on, We’re gonna be in a fight!, Te second Civil War,Buy more ammo etc. Yep boyz and Girlz that is exactly right! When I first discovered you people I had two handguns and a shotgun and a rifle. I thought “that’s enough” I only have two hands. Nope, (imagine that sound of a really loud buzzer). My “safe” room looks like a Branch Dividian annex! and I love it! “If” it comes to hostlities I just hope I give the B-sterds a run for their money. Be real careful guy’s, Protect your own. And don’t take any S**t!😣😣😣😣😣😣😣

  11. Rather than join the NSSF to fix the NICS, the Biden admin would rather do nothing, allow for more and more people who should not have access to firearms, to commit crimes and even murder to further their assault on law abiding American citizens with over reaching, non-Constitutional laws.

  12. The government has decided that the government is responsible, so you taxpayers have to pay 250 million more dollars.

    That’s not the big win you might think it is.

  13. “Oops: Department of Justice Acknowledges That Criminals Commit Gun Crimes”

    Oops! Did you mean “crimes with/using guns”?

    We have the lame stream media using made-up terms to deflect criticism.

    We PotG don’t need to do so.

    • Can anyone at NSSF explain exactly how fixing NICS will prevent Black Market sales? Straw Purchases?
      One takes place whether NICS is there or not. The other requires Gun Stores to train their employees to watch for the signs and behaviors that may indicate the sale is potentially a Straw Purchase, an iffy an purely subjective proposition at best. Fixing NICS will have no impact on Black Market Sales, questionable if any impact on Straw Purchases, and absolutely no effect on Stolen firearms.
      Fixing NICS is a noble goal, but it will not put an end to criminal misuse of Firearms, because the Sutherland Springs shooter is statistically an outlier. The fact remains that far more crime involving firearms is committed with Black Market and Stolen Weapons, than Straw Purchased and NICS Failure Weapons. The statistics change very little year to year, but hovers somewhere between 85% to 95% or about a 90% average. I don’t know what that translates to with Obummers Common Crap/Core Math, buy when I was in school, that means roughly 9 out of 10 crimes are committed with either a Stolen or Black Market Firearm. Both of which are crimes in and of themselves, and both of which NICS has zero impact on

      Hate to rain on the NSSF’s parade, but NICS is not and never will be the end all, be all of Gun Crime Prevention. NICS will always remain a risk to the Law Abiding Citizenry as the Government can arbitrarily and capresciously use to infringe upon a Citizen’s 2nd Amendment Rights, by delays and denials, which the Citizen is then required to pursue over a lengthy period of time, and a not insignificant amount of money to correct the “Government’s error.
      The Government admitting criminals are the problem in a Court of Law won’t change the Lies and Obfuscating Propaganda coming from the Democrats and their MSM Butt Buddies.

  14. “Fixing NICS will have no impact on Black Market Sales, questionable if any impact on Straw Purchases, and absolutely no effect on Stolen firearms.”

    Well, I never….

    When a NICS check denies a criminal an opportunity to buy a gun through a retail outlet, that criminal can never buy from a gun store, anywhere, and the criminal knows it; they will never try again.

    When a criminal fails a background check, they should be given contact information for a licensed social worker. The social worker can teach conflict resolution, and encourage alternative lifestyles that will rehabilitate the criminal, who then becomes an effective influencer among the criminal society, leading other criminals to abandon bad behaviors. The rehabilitated then circulate among the criminal society (that doesn’t try to buy guns legally), changing lives, and improving society for everyone. Failing a NICS check is a good thing, officially identifying those most in need of care, and attention. Give peace a chance.

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