Sen. Mike Lee refutes the myth propagated by Democrats that would-be mass shooters like the Islamic terrorist Omar Mateen can evade background checks by purchasing weapons online or at gun shows.
Writes Lee in an op-ed at The Daily Signal:
This is just plain false. There is no such thing as a “gun show” or “online” loophole to federal background check requirements. Federal law does not care where or when a gun transaction happens, only who is involved in that transaction.
So if you go to a “weekend gun show” and buy a gun from one of the many licensed gun dealers there, you will still have to undergo a background check. Same if you buy a gun online.
What matters is who is selling the gun and how often they sell them. If you sell your friends or neighbors an occasional firearm, you don’t need to conduct a background check. But if you are “engaged in the business” of selling firearms, then you do need to administer a background check on every sale.
And that wasn’t the only tall tale Murphy told. Murphy also claimed that: “AR-15-style weapons weren’t legal in the United States until 2004 after being banned for 10 years. It is not coincidental that there was a massive increase in mass shootings in this country after 2004.”
Again, this is just plain false. According to Northeastern University criminology professor James Alan Fox there were about 18 mass shooting a year in the two decades before the assault weapons ban, 19 mass shootings a year in the decade during the assault weapons ban, and 21 mass shooting a year after the ban.
Murphy’s post-assault weapons ban shooting spike is pure myth.
