SARASOTA – After the House passed a pair of bills aimed at expanding background checks for gun purchases, a Suncoast state representative is calling the legislative bills unconstitutional for law-abiding gun owners.
While gun control activists celebrate – saying the proposed bills could prevent mass shootings in the country.
On the third-year anniversary of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, FL President Joe Biden called on Congress to pass stricter gun laws, including banning assault weapons.
In response, Congress last week passed two legislative bills looking to expand on universal background checks. But not all agreed with the measures.
Florida State Representative Greg Steube says the proposed bills are unconstitutional for law-abiding gun owners and that the measures wouldn’t help in preventing crime or the next mass shooting.
“Las year I sat on the judiciary committee and offered an amendment to the universal background checks bill that would’ve required for the FBI to alert local law enforcement that an illegal immigrant is attempting to illegally obtain a firearm,” said Congressman Steube. “Every single Democrat on that committee voted against that amendment that would’ve protected our community.”
The proposed bill H.R. 8 which passed 227 to 203, would require background checks on nearly all gun purchases, including transactions involving unlicensed or private sellers.
While H.R. 1446 aims to close the so-called “Charleston Loophole,” which allows the sale of a firearm to proceed if a background check isn’t completed within three days, by expanding the review period to 10 days. That bill passing in a 219 to 210 vote.
Both measures that gun control activist Robert Schentrup agrees the Sunshine State needs to combat the purchase of “ghost guns.”
“Right now, we have the private sale loophole in the state of Florida, but with “ghost guns” you don’t even need to meet someone in person to exchange for [the sale of] a firearm,” said Schentrup. “You can just buy all the parts online with a credit card.”
A personal fight for Schentrup, after losing his sister Carmen in the Parkland shooting. He joined Team Enough with Brady United working to help pass common sense gun control laws that could have saved the life of his sister.
“As we start to see a trend toward strengthening those laws, we’ll start to see a trend in the decrease of pedestrian gun violence,” said Schentrup. “In this conversation what’s really important, the gun violence that we see is a problem. It’s both grounded in making sure that we want to reduce it.”
The proposed bill sits at the Senate but even with all democrats potentially in favor of the bills, they would still need the support of at least 10 Republicans to pass the measure.
