Principled Americans might recall that, circa 2018, Ms. Bondi and Mr. Trump appeared side-by-side in Florida at a press conference in which they extolled the virtues of her efforts as then-Florida Attorney General, to execute the equivalent of Red Flag gun-grabs -- or what she termed, “Gun Violence Restraining Orders” – on people who had not been granted due process, not been convicted of any crime, and are, by definition as human beings who supposedly possess the right to keep and bear arms, unmolested by government goons.
Mr. Trump’s triumphal enthusiasm alarmed many traditional conservatives, who saw him nod as she blissfully promoted the idea of government agents engaging in towering attacks on the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unwarranted searches and seizures, the Fifth Amendment’s prohibition of government depriving people of life, liberty, or property without due process, the Sixth Amendment’s promise of a speedy trial by a jury of one’s peers, the right to face one’s accuser(s) and the right to call witnesses for one’s defense, the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment (how can one be punished if one has not been accused of a crime and put on trial?), and the Fourteenth Amendment’s reiteration of due process.
Mr. Trump added to the frustration and alarm by issuing in his first term unconstitutional so-called “Executive Orders” through which he attempted to ban “bump stocks” and pistol braces.
But now, both Mr. Trump and U.S. Attorney General Bondi seem to be singing a different tune, a pro-gun-rights song that comes to us on the changeable winds of political expediency.
Reason’s Jacob Sullum reports that Trump’s AG issued a new “interim final rule” pertaining to convicted and released felons who, since they have been deemed safe enough to be in society, are supposed to be able to exercise their gun rights, but have been prohibited by government.
In fact, it’s a change that pertains to Donald Trump.
“Although President Donald Trump has been entrusted with control of the nation's vast military might, including its nuclear weapons, he is not allowed to own a gun. He lost that right as a result of 34 state felony convictions involving falsification of business records. Whatever you think of the legally dubious case underlying those convictions, this situation makes no sense as a matter of public safety. It epitomizes the absurdly broad criteria that bar Americans from possessing firearms under federal law.”
And, when Sullum writes of “criteria” he means unconstitutional federal statute.
“Under 18 USC 922(g), prohibited persons include anyone who has been convicted of a crime punishable by more than a year of incarceration, regardless of the sentence that was actually imposed, whether or not the offense involved violence, and no matter how long ago it happened. This is the provision that forced Trump to give up his guns, even though his offenses were nonviolent and did not result in any formal punishment. The law also prohibits gun possession by anyone who has ever been subjected to involuntary psychiatric treatment, even if he was never deemed a threat to others.
Anyone who defies these bans is committing a federal felony punishable by up to 15 years in prison. He could face additional penalties for lying on the federal form that must be completed to buy a gun from a federally licensed dealer, which can be construed as two distinct felonies under 18 USC 922(a)(6) and 18 USC 924 (a)(1)(A), and for ‘trafficking in firearms,’ which Congress has counterintuitively defined to include prohibited persons who obtain guns. All told, a prohibited person who dares to exercise his Second Amendment rights could face combined maximum sentences of nearly half a century.”
Lovely.
Perspicacious Americans likely notice in those federal codes blatant attacks on the Fourth Amendment -- via an invasion of privacy at the point of purchase -- and attacks on the aforementioned Fifth Amendment’s prohibition against seizure without due process. No due process is afforded if the government engages in an a-priori restraint of a right.
Sullum adds:
“Under 18 USC 925(c), someone who loses his gun rights can ask the attorney general to restore them. The attorney general has the discretion to do that based on a determination that ‘the circumstances regarding the disability, and the applicant's record and reputation, are such that the applicant will not be likely to act in a manner dangerous to public safety and that the granting of the relief would not be contrary to the public interest.’ But that responsibility historically has been delegated to the ATF, which Congress has barred from considering such applications.”
Here, we can recall that the ATF’s so-called “purview” over our right to keep and bear arms is not sanctioned by the U.S. Constitution, but a strong understanding of this Trump Administration change is important.
Writes Sullum:
“Attorney General Pam Bondi recently took an important step toward addressing the unjust, constitutionally dubious burdens imposed by that policy. An interim final rule that took effect last week aims to revive the moribund legal process for restoring the Second Amendment rights of ‘prohibited persons’ who pose no threat to public safety. The rule rescinds the delegation of that process to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), which Congress has long prohibited from accepting applications for relief.”
In other words, the ATF had been given the power to review the applications, but Congress prevented that from happening…
"’In the early 1990s,’ Bondi's interim final rule says, ‘Congress became concerned about the number of resources that ATF was using to adjudicate requests to relieve individual Americans from disabilities on their ownership of firearms.’ Legislators worried that ‘judging whether applicants posed 'a danger to public safety' was 'a very difficult and subjective task…'”
So, in 1992, Congress attached a “spending rider” to the ATF budget that has been renewed each year, and which prohibited the ATF from using any of its appropriated funds to “investigate or act upon applications for relief from Federal firearms disabilities" under Section 935(c).
As a result, the practical outcome for many Americans in this dubious limbo state has been obstruction of their right to keep and bear arms.
“Bondi says reasserting the attorney general's authority to implement Section 935(c) is consistent with Trump's February 6 executive order ‘protecting Second Amendment rights,’ which instructed her to ‘examine all orders, regulations, guidance, plans, international agreements, and other actions of executive departments and agencies’ to ‘assess any ongoing infringements of the Second Amendment rights of our citizens.’"
But the larger rights, and logic, problem persists.
If a person is deemed safe enough to be out of jail, why is that person not safe enough to exercise a God-given right to keep and bear arms? If that person is not safe enough to keep and bear arms, why is he or she out of prison? And if that person is not safe enough, will a government proscription of him legally owning a gun stop him from acquiring one on the black market? And how does this new stance comport with Bondi and Trump's previous affection for clear attacks on gun rights via Red Flag statutes?
Related: Bride-to-Be Left With Broken Nose & Teeth By a Random Assault in Dallas
The upshot of these questions is that any collectivist system of so-called “policing” and “protection” will see an ever-permutating set of government players and citizens trying to impose their disparate views on how the justice system is to be run.
But the Founders made their disputes moot.
Unless the U.S. Constitution is amended, the Second Amendment is clear: no level of government shall prohibit the right to keep and bear arms.
Bondi’s move is a good first step. But it is a step that need not be taken, if the U.S. government would simply abide by the Constitution.