Acting FBI Deputy Director David Bowdich testified Wednesday that Barack Obama’s Justice Department directed the FBI to drop more than 500,000 names of fugitives with outstanding arrest warrants from the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
For a president who talked so much about gun control, removing half-a-million fugitives from the national background check system is going to increase gun deaths. Remember, Obama, too, spoke of strengthening background checks.
According to the Daily Wire,
Sen. Diane Feinstein had said that “It’s my understanding that under federal law fugitives cannot legally purchase or possess guns. We’ve heard from local law enforcement that the Justice Department has issued a memo that forced the FBI NICS background check database to drop more than 500,000 names of fugitives with outstanding arrest warrants because it was uncertain whether those fugitives had fled across state lines.”
“Mr. Bowdich, can you describe why this determination was made by the Justice Department?” Feinstein asked.
“That was a decision that was made under the previous administration,” Bowdich replied. “It was the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel that reviewed the law and believed that it needed to be interpreted so that if someone was a fugitive in a state, there had to be indications that they had crossed state lines.”
To give some context, the FBI had considered any person with an outstanding arrest warrant to be a fugitive. That was contrary to how the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives defined a fugitive – as someone who has an outstanding arrest warrant and has crossed state lines. Obama’s DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel sided with the ATF’s definition, which resulted in 500,000 fugitives who had not (yet) crossed state lines being dropped from the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, allowing them to pass the background check needed to obtain a firearm.
Certainly we can all agree that allowing 500,000 criminals own guns is more dangerous than allowing the other 300+ million Americans to own guns.
Think this is another scandal Obama tried to sweep under the rug? Tell us your thoughts below!
