The Obama administration’s attitude on gun owners and their rights, which are defended buy the 2nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, place gun owners in the same category as criminals and drug dealers. A perfect example of this is U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents teaming up with local police officers in Southern California to drive around the parking lot of a large gun show to gather all of the cars’ information.
The two organizations have used license plate readers at Southern California gun shows to cross check the cars parked at the gun show with those crossing the border into Mexico. The owners of these vehicles were not informed of this and were under no suspicion for any illegal activity. There were no arrests made. In fact, the surveillance didn’t even produce any leads. What it did do is lead to information that makes the public aware that this is not the first sweep of this kind. More importantly, no one knows where this information is stored with the government.
Now, technically this procedure is considered illegal. Federal law prohibits the government from compiling a registry of firearms or their owners from certain types of specified information. But, here’s the catch, the use of license plate readers, also known as LPRs, is exempt from the law because they are new technology that did not exist when this was put into law, rendering them unregulated.
Many supporters of the Second Amendment were not happy about this procedure and called it an abuse of technology. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and a company that manufactures LPR systems are two noteworthy opponents of the practice. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) also shared his disapproval in a letter to ICE’s director, Sarah R. Saldaña. He wrote, “Constitutionally-protected activities should not subject gun show attendees to unwarranted and heavy-handed surveillance practices by their government.” These are nothing short of abusive tactics that link not only gun owners, but people that attend gun shows, to criminals or terrorists.
The protection offered by the 2nd Amendment is truly on the ballot in the upcoming election. If the decision is left up to the Democrats, those who want to exercise their right to bear arms are in big trouble. Leaked audio, straight from Clinton’s mouth during a private fundraiser, captured Hillary saying, “The Supreme Court is wrong on the Second Amendment. And I’m going to make that case every chance I get.” During an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, he asked Clinton, “I want to ask you a specific question. Do you believe that an individual’s right to bear arms is a constitutional right – which it’s not linked to service in a militia?”
To the dismay of many gun owners she responded with, “then it, like every other constitutional right, is subject to reasonable regulations. And what people have done with that decision is to take it as far as they possibly can and reject what has been our history from the very beginning of the republic.”
[revad2]
