--You decide

Senator Lindsey Graham was one of nine Republicans to vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

During the course of her confirmation hearings, Sotomayor told the Senate and all Americans that she would respect the Heller decision and the individual right to keep and bear arms.

The assurances made by Sotomayor, not surprisingly, were meaningless. Less than a year after her confirmation hearings, Sotomayor signed a dissenting opinion in the McDonald case that stated, "I can find nothing in the Second Amendment's text, history, or underlying rationale that could warrant characterizing it as 'fundamental' insofar as it seeks to protect the keeping and bearing of arms for private self-defense purposes."

Of course, this surprised no one, and GOA had warned all Senators that this type of decision could be expected from Sotomayor. But Sen. Graham voted for her anyway.

Now the Senate is debating the confirmation of Supreme Court justice nominee Elena Kagan.

During her hearings last week, Kagan ducked and dodged questions about the Second Amendment, and she refused to declare whether she believes the Second Amendment protects an individual right.

While Kagan blathered on and on about precedent and "settled law" with regard to the Supreme Court decisions in Heller and McDonald, this in no way precludes her from ruling that almost any gun law -- including gun owner registration, purchasing limits, waiting periods, private sale background checks, and more -- are consistent with the Constitution.

As GOA attorney William J. Olson, who testified at the hearings, noted: "If [Kagan] were to go on the Court, with what we know about her now, she could be the most anti-gun justice on that Court." (Click HERE for video of that testimony.)

Sen. Graham claims to support the Second Amendment. Well, if that's the case then there is NO WAY he can vote to confirm anti-gun radical Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court of the United States!

Lindsey Graham got burned by Justice Sotomayor, but has he learned his lesson? It is imperative that gun owners contact Sen. Graham right away and urge him to come out now against the confirmation of Elena Kagan.

Several Senators have already issued statements that they intend to vote against Kagan. Sen. Graham should join them in opposing a nominee who is extremely hostile to the Second Amendment.

ACTION: If you are a South Carolina voter, contact Senator Lindsey Graham and urge him to oppose Elena Kagan for the U.S. Supreme Court. Please ask your family and friends to do the same. A prewritten letter is provided below for you to copy-and-paste or to guide your own comments.

Contact info:

Sen. Lindsey Graham

Phone -- (202) 224-5972

Webform -- http://lgraham.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.EmailSenatorGraham

----- Pre-written letter -----

Dear Senator Graham:

You claim to be a supporter of the Second Amendment. If that is the case, there is NO WAY that you can vote to confirm radical anti-gunner Elena Kagan to the U.S. Supreme Court.

During her confirmation hearings last week, Kagan ducked and dodged questions about the Second Amendment, and she refused to declare whether she believes the Second Amendment protects an individual right.

While Kagan blathered on and on about precedent and "settled law" with regard to the Supreme Court decisions in Heller and McDonald, this in no way precludes her from ruling that almost any gun law -- including gun owner registration, purchasing limits, waiting periods, private sale background checks, and more -- are consistent with the Constitution.

As GOA attorney William J. Olson, who testified at the hearings, noted: "If [Kagan] were to go on the Court, with what we know about her now, she could be the most anti-gun justice on that Court."

I urge you in the strongest possible terms to oppose Elena Kagan and join a filibuster of her nomination.

Sincerely,

Last week, the Senate Homeland Security Committee held a hearing on two Lautenberg proposals. The first, S.1317 is a bill that would grant the attorney general the power to deny the transfer of firearms if the AG determines that the transferee is a suspected terrorist. Citizens wrongly placed on a no-fly list would lose their constitutional right to possess a firearm without any due process. The second bill, S.2820, would allow gun records to be maintained by the federal government for six months. These ideas infringe on law-abiding citizens’ right to self defense. 

Brian Darling is director of U.S. Senate Relations at The Heritage Foundation.   The article above appeared in Human Events

One of the bills, S. 1317, would allow the Attorney General to deny the purchase of a firearm to any of the more than 400,000 people on the “terrorist watch list.”  Under this bill, the Attorney General (the current AG, Eric Holder, is extremely hostile to gun rights) is permitted to strip away the civil liberties of Americans without due process of law and without the accused even knowing the details of the suspicion.

This bill takes the responsibility of determining a person’s guilt or innocence out of the hands of the courts and places it in the hands of the Attorney General, who is not required to produce evidence for such a determination, let alone prove it.

The second bill, S. 2820, would require that if an individual on the government terrorist watch list purchases a firearm, the record of the purchase must be retained for ten years.  The same objections apply here as to S. 1317.

But there is a much more sinister aspect to this bill.  It also requires information obtained on ALL firearms background checks be kept for AT LEAST six months.

Currently, most information obtained through background checks of firearms purchasers must be destroyed within 24 hours.  The Lautenberg bill would gut such privacy protections and create de facto gun owner registration.

Frank Lautenberg has long been an anti-Second Amendment activist, so no one should be fooled by his latest assault on freedom.  It’s not just suspected terrorists that Mr. Lautenberg wants only to disarm—if he had his way guns would be banned entirely.  His strategy is to constantly nibble away at the Second Amendment until only the police and the criminals have guns.

The intent of the Founding Fathers and the liberties of the people are apparently as meaningful to Lautenberg as is the oath that he swore to uphold the Constitution.

GOA and its members will continue to work for the defeat of these two blatantly unconstitutional bills.

The Obama Administration and dozens of politicians are pretending that they are worried that America’s loose gun laws have allowed guns to be smuggled into Mexico for use in the drug wars that are plaguing that country.

 President Obama is using this nonsense as an excuse to double the number of BATFE agents so he can blanket the border with agents to stop the flow of guns into Mexico.

 What nonsense!  As if the drug cartels that have their own armies, huge fleet of airplanes, submarines and rocket launchers need to rely on smugglers to get guns from the U.S.!

 Clearly, this is nothing other than the latest tactic from this antigun administration to add some muscle to the most reckless and corrupt branch of our government – the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

 A couple of decades ago, Congress passed the FOPA (Firearm Owners Protection Act) to reign in this renegade agency after a Congressional investigation officially concluded that “seventy-five percent of BATFE prosecutions were constitutionally improper."

 Today, twenty-four years later, the BATFE is just as bad, if not worse, than it was back then.  Only now the White house and the Congress are filled with people who want to give them more power, more authority and more boots on the ground to continue their unconstitutional attack on gun owners.

 From using paid “informants” to provide false testimony, to physically tampering with firearms to turn them into “machine guns,” to abusing and harassing mom and pop gun shops who cannot afford to legally defend themselves, this agency appears not only to have little or no regards for the rights of citizens, but is clearly willing even to ignore the rulings of the Supreme Court.

 As you know, over the years, Gun Owners has helped dozens of victims of BATFE abuse.  Some of these victims were literally framed by BATFE agents who actually converted semi-automatic firearms into fully automatic weapons – and then charged them with selling unregistered machine guns!

 In one case that we were involved with, the Olofson Case, we discovered that the alleged “machine gun” was, in reality, one of thousands of ordinary semi-automatic rifles made by Olympic Arms.  We learned that it only became a machine gun when the BATFE, behind closed doors, mechanically tampered with the rifle to the extent that it would misfire a burst of several rounds before it jammed.

 Getting guns to malfunction is a favorite technique of the BATFE as it gives them a great opportunity to rack up convictions on the possession or selling of “machine guns,” which requires a special type of license.

 For some time, Gun Owners has lobbied to require the BATFE to videotape their test firings of alleged machines.  We knew that if juries could see the outrageous, even bizarre, efforts the agency uses to get a gun to fire off an extra round or two, they would throw all of these cases out of court and Congress would have the evidence it needs to take action and clean house at this agency.

 Unlike all other agencies, the BATFE has no sets of standards or rules for conducting their business.  They have no manuals that set out procedures for the work they do. This gives them the latitude to do whatever they wish with total impunity.

 And this is what enables them to make the rules up as they go along.  This allows them to conduct repeated “test firings” until they get the results they are looking for.

 Clearly, when a test firing fails to prove that a weapon is a machine gun that should be the end

of any debate as to whether a person is selling “machine guns.”  But because the BATFE has no rules, they simply do it again and again, until they are able to force a gun to misfire.

 As you can see, with a renegade agency like this trampling our gun rights, nobody is safe.  Not you, not me and not our favorite semi-automatic firearm.

 That is why we are really encouraged about the Fairness in Firearms Testing Act (H.R. 1923).  Introduced by Congressman Phil Gingrey, this bill will require that an unedited video be recorded during the testing of a firearm to determine if it is a machine gun.

 Had such a law been in place when David Olofson’s rifle was being “tested,” his case would have been thrown out immediately and he would be home today with his wife and three children.

 Had such a law been in place, jurors, the media and the Congress would have seen the extent to which the BATFE is capable of and willing to trample the rights of citizens in their frenzy to put innocent gun owners behind bars.

 Sadly, H.R. 1923 is not yet the law of the land.  And, until it is passed, there will be more innocent Americans victimized by this out-of-control agency that acts more like a subsidiary of the anti-gun lobby than an agency under the jurisdiction of the federal government.

 The Fairness in Firearms Testing Act ought to be an easy bill to pass.  Who can defend an agency that tampers with evidence to make their case or who pays thugs to entrap ordinary law-abiding citizens?

 But with folks like Chuck Schumer and Caroline McCarthy running the Congress, it may be a lot tougher to pass such a sensible bill than you might imagine.  That is why I am looking for all all-out effort from you and all the other members of GOA.

 Over the years, GOA has fought for a wide variety of gun rights issues.  Our yardstick for which issues we choose to prioritize is based on securing the liberty of ordinary citizens.  To me, the Olofson case is a clear example of what happens to our freedoms if we let our government abuse the law for its own purposes.

 David Olofson has been robbed of all his freedom, not just his right to keep and bear arms.  He has lost his liberty, his family, and his life outside of prison.

 It is just a turn of fate that it is David Olofson, not you or me that is rotting away in prison.  Please think about that when I ask you to sign the postcards I have enclosed.  The first postcard is addressed to David.  I have left the message side blank so you can choose your own words to let him know that there are a lot of gun owners out there praying for his release or whatever you wish to say to him.

 Of the remaining postcards, one is for you and one for a friend or neighbor.  These postcards express our outrage at the lack of oversight this out-of-control agency receives and demands that H.R. 1923 be passed immediately so that no more innocent American citizens are framed and sentenced to prison so that the BATFE can rack up big numbers in their arrest column.

 I also need you to try to make a generous contribution to Gun Owners so we can ramp up our efforts to find more cosponsors for H.R. 1923; call for an investigation into BATFE abuses; and continue our efforts to get David Olofson released and returned to his family.

 Please try to be as generous as you can because every day this innocent gun owner remains in jail is not just a personal tragedy for the Olofson family, it remains a threat to all law-abiding gun owners.

 I know that money is tight right now.  I feel it the same as you do and, at Gun Owners, we are doing everything we can to stretch every dollar for maximum effect.

 So please, even if you cannot afford to send as much as you have done in the past, please try to send what you can safely afford.

 Thank you again for your loyalty and your continued support for our work.

 Sincerely,

 Larry Pratt

Executive Director