Committee Hearings Could Take Place Soon!
Ex-NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s national gun control group Everytown continues to mislead lawmakers that these two bills simply close the non-existent “gun show loophole” and regulate online firearms sales. In fact, these measures are far more expansive.
If you’re already familiar with these measures, scroll down to the action items below. If you are just learning about them, read on below to find out how restrictive this legislation is:
Senate Bill 48 & House Bill 50 prohibit you from selling your firearms to any distant relatives, friends, neighbors, business associates, or fellow gun club members without government permission. The bills would criminalize nearly all private firearm sales between individuals, regardless of where those transactions take place, and require them to be conducted through a licensed dealer involving extensive federal paperwork, background check and payment of an undetermined fee. Licensed dealers will have to maintain the paperwork recording these transfers for twenty years. Limited exceptions are only made for immediate family members, FFLs and law enforcement agencies, executors or administrators of estates and trusts, or police officers, military personnel, and licensed security guards acting in the course of their official duties.
SB 48 & HB 50 similarly restrict temporary firearm transfers -- including gifts, loans, and temporary changes in possession of a firearm, not just gun sales. There are a limited number of exemptions, including transfers necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm, those taking place exclusively at shooting ranges, while hunting or trapping, or during an organized competition or performance, or any time the transferor remains present the entire duration of the transfer. These exemptions are confusing, raise serious questions about the bills’ scope, compliance and enforceability, and highlight the overreach of the measures. Activities that could be criminalized under the bills without going through an FFL and obtaining government permission:
- A man loaning his girlfriend or fiancée his handgun for self-protection when homes or apartments in her neighborhood have been burglarized;
- A member of the military who is deployed overseas and wants to store his or her personal firearms with a trusted friend;
- Someone borrowing their co-worker’s gun to take on a hunting trip, to the local range or to shoot on BLM land when the colleague cannot accompany him or her on the excursion.
- Working ranch employees possessing and transporting ranch-owned rifles in vehicles or on their person.
- Volunteers staging auction or raffle items for a non-profit, charitable fundraising event where a firearm is displayed.
SB 48 & 50 also require the return of loaned firearms to original owners be conducted through a licensed dealer, with completion of federal paperwork and payment of an undetermined fee. The bill exempts “temporary” exchanges and only then if the transfer and the transferee’s possession take place exclusively at one of the locations or during one of the activities listed in the paragraph above. How are the original owners of firearms supposed to take back permanent possession of their loaned guns once they and the original transferee go their separate ways?
These proposals will tax scarce law enforcement resources, cost law-abiding citizens time, money and freedom, and they will do nothing to stop criminals. For more information, click here. Please click the “Take Action” button above to contact your state lawmakers and the members of the committees to whom these bills have been referred and urge them to oppose these measures!
SB 48 – Referred to Senate Public Affairs Committee & Senate Judiciary Committee
Public Affairs:
Chair Gerald Ortiz Y Pino (D-ABQ)
505-986-4482
[email protected]
Sen. Bill O’Neill (D-ABQ)
505-986-4260
[email protected]
Sen. Craig Brandt (R-Rio Rancho)
505-986-4385
[email protected]
Sen. Candace Gould (R-ABQ)
505-986-4266
[email protected]
Sen. Liz Stefanics (D-Santa Fe)
505-986-4834
[email protected]
Sen. Jeff Steinborn (D-Las Cruces)
505-986-4862
[email protected]
Sen. Mimi Stewart (D-ABQ)
505-986-4267
[email protected]
Sen. Stuart Ingle (R-Portales)
505-986-4702
[email protected]
Judiciary:
Chair Richard Martinez (D-Espanola)
505-986-4487
[email protected]
Sen. Daniel Ivey-Soto (D-ABQ)
505-986-4270
[email protected]
Sen. Greg Baca (R-Belen)
505-986-4874
[email protected]
Sen. Jacob Candelaria (D-ABQ)
505-986-4369
[email protected]
Sen. Joseph Cervantes (D-Las Cruces)
505-986-4385
[email protected]
Sen. Ron Griggs (R-Alamogordo)
505-986-4276
[email protected]
Sen. Linda Lopez (D-ABQ)
505-986-4737
[email protected]
Sen. Cisco McSorley (D-ABQ)
505-986-4389
[email protected]
Sen. Mark Moores (R-ABQ)
505-986-4859
[email protected]
Sen. Peter Wirth (D-Santa Fe)
505-986-4861
[email protected]
Sen. Bill Payne (R-ABQ)
505-986-4703
[email protected]
HB 50 – Referred to House Consumer & Public Affairs Committee & House Judiciary Committee
Consumer & Public Affairs:
Chair Eliseo Alcon (D-Milan)
505-986-4220
[email protected]
Rep. Patricia Roybal Caballero (D-ABQ)
505-986-4221
[email protected]
Rep. Deborah Armstrong (D-ABQ)
505-986-4435
[email protected]
Rep. Bob Wooley (R-Roswell)
505-986-4454
[email protected]
Rep. Monica Youngblood (R-ABQ)
505-986-4242
[email protected]
Judiciary:
Chair Gail Chasey (D-ABQ)
505-986-4236
[email protected]
Rep. Javier Martinez (D-ABQ)
505-986-4464
[email protected]
Rep. Eliseo Alcon (D-Milan)
505-986-4220
[email protected]
Rep. Cathrynn Brown (R-Carlsbad)
505-986-4415
[email protected]
Rep. Zach Cook (R-Ruidoso)
505-986-4411
[email protected]
Rep. Jim Dines (R-ABQ)
505-986-4242
[email protected]
Rep. Brian Egolf (D-Santa Fe)
505-986-4782
[email protected]
Rep. Daymon Ely (D-Corrales)
505-986-4454
[email protected]
Rep. Nate Gentry (R-ABQ)
505-986-4757
[email protected]
Rep. Georgene Louis (D-ABQ)
505-986-4236
[email protected]
Rep. Matthew McQueen (D-Santa Fe)
505-986-4214
[email protected]
Rep. Greg Nibert (R-Roswell)
505-986-4211
[email protected]
Rep. Bill Rehm (R-ABQ)
505-986-4425
[email protected]