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CNN Live Sunday
New Gun Bill Would Cut Document Destruction To 24 Hours
Aired December 21, 2003 - 18:45 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, there's a new battle in the war over gun control. At issue -- what should happen to the background check records produced when someone buys a gun?
They're currently destroyed within 90 days of the sale. But a new bill would cut that time period down to 24 hours. Is that a good idea?
Joining us now from Washington is Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America, and from San Francisco, Eric Gorovitz, policy director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence.
Thank you very much, gentlemen, for being here today.
ERIC GOROVITZ, POLICY DIRECTOR, COALITION TO STOP GUN VIOLENCE: Good evening.
LARRY PRATT, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, GUN OWNERS OF AMERICA: You're welcome.
LIN: Larry, let me begin with you. Why the rush to destroy these records?
PRATT: Well, it's -- the records have been compiled in the name of protection, of gun safety kinds of ideas.
But in fact, we have found over the years that these records of people who bought a gun a what kind of gun they have, have no utility in solving crimes. They stop a bad guy maybe from getting a gun at a store, but they don't stop bad guys from getting guns.
And this is something that Professor Jens Ludwig found when he examined -- and he's an anti-gun scholar, I should add -- he examined the early years of the Brady law and its effect, and found that there was no effect on lowering crime.
So here we have a violation of the rights of American gun owners, and all for something that is not useful for law enforcement. In fact, it's a distraction, because it means they've got to use resources for something that's not solving a crime.
Canada has registered all handguns since 1934, and it has never, ever been useful in solving one crime.
So, we think the law should be obeyed -- the law actually says "immediately" -- that's been defined as 90 days.
LIN: All right. Let's get Eric in here.
PRATT: It all depends on what you mean by days (ph).
LIN: Let's get Eric in here.
Eric Gorovitz, I mean, an assistant attorney general actually wrote a letter to the House when it was considering this legislation, saying that it really isn't helpful to law enforcement to have these records any longer than 24 hours.
GOROVITZ: Well, you know, this legislation is nothing new. The gun lobby has tried, as far as I can tell, at least eight times in the past to get this through. They've tried appropriations riders. They've tried independent bills. They've tried lawsuits. They tried an administrative process last year.
And every single time -- a couple of years ago -- and every single time, law enforcement comes out of the woodwork and says, this is a terrible idea. It's a dangerous proposal. The only people who benefit from it are terrorist gun traffickers and the extremist wing of the gun lobby.
The importance of those records is that it allows for the audit of the purchasing -- the background check system. And the FBI, when the gun lobby filed a lawsuit challenging the 90-day retention policy, the FBI said, we need that policy. We can't do this work without it. And, in fact, it ...
LIN: But isn't the initial work done upfront? I mean, you go in to try to buy a gun. You fill out the paperwork. There's a background check which uses the FBI's quick-check system.
And once that person is cleared, that person gets a gun. And what can be done with the paperwork? It's already done ...
GOROVITZ: Well, ...
LIN: ... its job.
GOROVITIZ: ... in most cases that's correct. But there are hundreds of cases in each 90-day period in which, for one reason or another, the initial background check misses a prohibited purchaser.
So the Government Accounting Office, the GAO, in a report it wrote in 2002, provided one -- just one of innumerable examples in which a person who is under a domestic violence restraining order that had not been entered into the system, but was in effect, bought a gun in September, in October bought another gun.
And during the background check process in October, it was determined that the September transfer was illegal, and law enforcement was able to go and retrieve that gun.
That was someone who was under a domestic violence restraining order -- a very dangerous situation for somebody to be purchasing a firearm. LIN: Right.
GOROVITZ: And thousands of illegal transfers have occurred because of flaws in the system, and many of those have been discovered because of these records.
LIN: That differs from what Larry was just telling us. Larry, why should gun owners be the exception to how privacy laws are balanced in?
Say, for example, President Bush signed some legislation recently that allowed credit companies and banks to sell personal information like Social Security numbers and the like.
You know, there are other examples. For example, the government is only required to keep tax returns for seven years. You know, doctors keep medical records for six years. What's 90 days by comparison?
PRATT: Well I think what's really analogous is that we're keeping these because everybody that's bought the gun is viewed as a suspect.
And I think, to understand what we're doing to gun owners, maybe it would be helpful to consider, should we do something similar for people who buy books? Should we keep lists of people who buy books ...
LIN: Well, books don't kill.
PRATT: ... from bookstores?
Ideas kill. Ideas on how to make bombs kill. Ideas on why I should die for my particular religion killed. So why don't we look into that?
That's something that the FBI has been considering doing. And there, understandably, has been an outcry about that.
So why should we say that something that doesn't work should be allowed to violate the shall not infringe language of the Second Amendment.
Look, England has banned guns. They're not going to let guns get into the wrong hands at all. Forget about the background check. Their problem is that their crime rate has gone up following the gun ban, just as Washington, D.C. saw its gun ...
LIN: As well as a drop in their economy.
PRATT: ... crime go up right next door into Virginia.
LIN: All right, Eric. I'm going to give you the last 15 seconds here.
GOROVITZ: Thank you. Let's be clear here. This proposal -- the current policy, the 90-day retention policy has been challenged in court. The gun lobby lost that like they lost every other attempt to make a change here.
It does not infringe on any rights. It's an appropriate balance. Privacy protections are well defined under the current policy. And that's why law enforcement is so adamantly opposed to deleting these records.
LIN: All right, ...
GOROVITZ: Especially at a time when we've gone to orange alert, it's a horrible thing to be talking about.
LIN: All right. Thank you very much, Eric Gorovitz, Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. Larry Pratt with the Gun Owners of America.
GOROVITZ: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 21, 2003 - 18:45 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, there's a new battle in the war over gun control. At issue -- what should happen to the background check records produced when someone buys a gun?
They're currently destroyed within 90 days of the sale. But a new bill would cut that time period down to 24 hours. Is that a good idea?
Joining us now from Washington is Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America, and from San Francisco, Eric Gorovitz, policy director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence.
Thank you very much, gentlemen, for being here today.
ERIC GOROVITZ, POLICY DIRECTOR, COALITION TO STOP GUN VIOLENCE: Good evening.
LARRY PRATT, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, GUN OWNERS OF AMERICA: You're welcome.
LIN: Larry, let me begin with you. Why the rush to destroy these records?
PRATT: Well, it's -- the records have been compiled in the name of protection, of gun safety kinds of ideas.
But in fact, we have found over the years that these records of people who bought a gun a what kind of gun they have, have no utility in solving crimes. They stop a bad guy maybe from getting a gun at a store, but they don't stop bad guys from getting guns.
And this is something that Professor Jens Ludwig found when he examined -- and he's an anti-gun scholar, I should add -- he examined the early years of the Brady law and its effect, and found that there was no effect on lowering crime.
So here we have a violation of the rights of American gun owners, and all for something that is not useful for law enforcement. In fact, it's a distraction, because it means they've got to use resources for something that's not solving a crime.
Canada has registered all handguns since 1934, and it has never, ever been useful in solving one crime.
So, we think the law should be obeyed -- the law actually says "immediately" -- that's been defined as 90 days.
LIN: All right. Let's get Eric in here.
PRATT: It all depends on what you mean by days (ph).
LIN: Let's get Eric in here.
Eric Gorovitz, I mean, an assistant attorney general actually wrote a letter to the House when it was considering this legislation, saying that it really isn't helpful to law enforcement to have these records any longer than 24 hours.
GOROVITZ: Well, you know, this legislation is nothing new. The gun lobby has tried, as far as I can tell, at least eight times in the past to get this through. They've tried appropriations riders. They've tried independent bills. They've tried lawsuits. They tried an administrative process last year.
And every single time -- a couple of years ago -- and every single time, law enforcement comes out of the woodwork and says, this is a terrible idea. It's a dangerous proposal. The only people who benefit from it are terrorist gun traffickers and the extremist wing of the gun lobby.
The importance of those records is that it allows for the audit of the purchasing -- the background check system. And the FBI, when the gun lobby filed a lawsuit challenging the 90-day retention policy, the FBI said, we need that policy. We can't do this work without it. And, in fact, it ...
LIN: But isn't the initial work done upfront? I mean, you go in to try to buy a gun. You fill out the paperwork. There's a background check which uses the FBI's quick-check system.
And once that person is cleared, that person gets a gun. And what can be done with the paperwork? It's already done ...
GOROVITZ: Well, ...
LIN: ... its job.
GOROVITIZ: ... in most cases that's correct. But there are hundreds of cases in each 90-day period in which, for one reason or another, the initial background check misses a prohibited purchaser.
So the Government Accounting Office, the GAO, in a report it wrote in 2002, provided one -- just one of innumerable examples in which a person who is under a domestic violence restraining order that had not been entered into the system, but was in effect, bought a gun in September, in October bought another gun.
And during the background check process in October, it was determined that the September transfer was illegal, and law enforcement was able to go and retrieve that gun.
That was someone who was under a domestic violence restraining order -- a very dangerous situation for somebody to be purchasing a firearm. LIN: Right.
GOROVITZ: And thousands of illegal transfers have occurred because of flaws in the system, and many of those have been discovered because of these records.
LIN: That differs from what Larry was just telling us. Larry, why should gun owners be the exception to how privacy laws are balanced in?
Say, for example, President Bush signed some legislation recently that allowed credit companies and banks to sell personal information like Social Security numbers and the like.
You know, there are other examples. For example, the government is only required to keep tax returns for seven years. You know, doctors keep medical records for six years. What's 90 days by comparison?
PRATT: Well I think what's really analogous is that we're keeping these because everybody that's bought the gun is viewed as a suspect.
And I think, to understand what we're doing to gun owners, maybe it would be helpful to consider, should we do something similar for people who buy books? Should we keep lists of people who buy books ...
LIN: Well, books don't kill.
PRATT: ... from bookstores?
Ideas kill. Ideas on how to make bombs kill. Ideas on why I should die for my particular religion killed. So why don't we look into that?
That's something that the FBI has been considering doing. And there, understandably, has been an outcry about that.
So why should we say that something that doesn't work should be allowed to violate the shall not infringe language of the Second Amendment.
Look, England has banned guns. They're not going to let guns get into the wrong hands at all. Forget about the background check. Their problem is that their crime rate has gone up following the gun ban, just as Washington, D.C. saw its gun ...
LIN: As well as a drop in their economy.
PRATT: ... crime go up right next door into Virginia.
LIN: All right, Eric. I'm going to give you the last 15 seconds here.
GOROVITZ: Thank you. Let's be clear here. This proposal -- the current policy, the 90-day retention policy has been challenged in court. The gun lobby lost that like they lost every other attempt to make a change here.
It does not infringe on any rights. It's an appropriate balance. Privacy protections are well defined under the current policy. And that's why law enforcement is so adamantly opposed to deleting these records.
LIN: All right, ...
GOROVITZ: Especially at a time when we've gone to orange alert, it's a horrible thing to be talking about.
LIN: All right. Thank you very much, Eric Gorovitz, Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. Larry Pratt with the Gun Owners of America.
GOROVITZ: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
