Washington, D.C. – With the Senate Appropriations Committee expected to take up the fiscal year 2014 budget on Thursday, gun-violence prevention experts will explain on a press call Wednesday morning why removing a dangerous rider from the budget legislation is critical to helping law enforcement officials keep guns out of the hands of criminals.
Since 2004 Congress has imposed restrictions on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, or ATF, in its annual budget that make it especially difficult for the agency to police lost and stolen guns. One such restriction, known as the lost and stolen gun rider, prevents the ATF from requiring gun dealers to conduct an annual inventory, a process that would allow dealers to promptly identify and report missing guns.
Every year tens of thousands of guns are discovered to be missing from the inventories of federally licensed gun dealers based on inspections of just 20 percent of those dealers. These missing guns—whether they are stolen, illegally sold, or misplaced due to negligent record keeping—pose serious threats to public safety. Guns stolen from dealers often end up in criminal hands.
On the press call, Mark Jones, former supervisory special agent with the ATF, will join CAP’s Arkadi Gerney to discuss the epidemic of lost and stolen guns in America and detail the prospects of Congress acting this year to remove the rider.
WHO:
- Arkadi Gerney, Senior Fellow and gun-violence prevention expert, Center for American Progress
- Mark Jones, former supervisory special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
WHEN:
Wednesday, July 16, 2013
10:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m.
DIAL-IN INFORMATION:
888-468-2440 — Passcode: 6110993#
RSVP:
Please confirm your participation in the call by contacting Katie Peters at [email protected] or 202.741.6285.
Related report from CAP:
Lost and Stolen Guns from Gun Dealers
This report by CAP experts Arkadi Gerney and Chelsea Parsons explores the problem of lost and stolen guns from gun dealers and how the rider plays a contributing role. Specifically, the report details 12 noteworthy examples of gun dealers failing to maintain control of their dangerous inventory.
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