A gun control lobbying group has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for allegedly “failing to disclose documents” revealing what influence a gun rights organization has had in influencing President Donald Trump’s “views towards gun policies.”
Simply translated, the anti-gunners want to know what the pro-gunners have been discussing with the administration and vice versa.
Would it be fair, then, for the National Rifle Association to file a lawsuit demanding to know what communications the Obama administration had with the Giffords group under its old name, Americans for Responsible Solutions, and with Everytown for Gun Safety, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, the Brady Center or one of the other gun control lobbying organizations.
According to The Hill, “The Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence filed the lawsuit this week against the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to force it to comply with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests into the administration’s correspondence with the NRA.”
Included in the 12-page lawsuit are these specific complaints:
“While the NRA issued no public statement in the immediate aftermath of the Las Vegas shooting, Dana Loesch, a spokeswoman affiliated with the lobbyist group, called for “prayer” and a tempering of calls for a policy response.
“The NRA’s official response to the Las Vegas tragedy, issued on October 5, 2017 likewise rejected calls for discussion of policy solutions that could reduce gun violence, and instead urged Congress to pass dangerous concealed carry “reciprocity” legislation that would put law enforcement at risk and allow dangerous people to carry guns nationwide without regard for the laws of the states they are in.”
Of particular interest in the lawsuit is a “white paper” authored by an ATF official earlier this year that talked about various gun regulation reforms that might be considered. Among those reforms are the easing of restrictions on “silencers.”
The Giffords group also wants to access any files “concerning Trump administration policies on concealed carry ‘reciprocity.’”
While it may seem silly, this may be the kind of hardball politics anti-gunners, who are flush with money from deep pockets people like Michael Bloomberg, will now practice to discourage any input that gun rights organizations might offer on firearm policies. Essentially, it suggests that organizations representing gun owners should not have discussions with the executive branch about policies that might impact their members.
So, now instead of just trying to limit the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, anti-gunners now appear to be interested in their First Amendment rights as well.
