President Barack Obama removed some language in his budget, released Wednesday, that restricts the ability of the federal government to regulate the firearms industry.
The pair of provisions ban law enforcement from requiring gun dealers to conduct an inventory once a year and defining antique firearms, which are not subject to federal firearms licensing procedures or background checks.Since the late 1970s, more than a dozen provisions have been added to must-pass spending bills with no hearings, no debate and no vote in a way that’s designed to circumvent the usual legislative process.
Some gun control advocates had quietly urged Obama – largely behind the scenes – to delete the language that has been pushed by the powerful gun lobby in his spending plan to be released April 10.
"By eliminating these unnecessary and dangerous gun riders from his budget proposal, President Obama took an important step forward in strengthening the federal government’s ability to regulate the firearms industry and fight gun-related crime," said Arkadi Gerney, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank that released a report on riders last month.
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