Fox News
Mayors and police in states like New York and California,
which have relatively restrictive guns laws, are organizing
against making concealed-handgun carry permits in one state
valid in all states.
Earlier this year, Sen. John Cornyn,
R-Texas, and Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., introduced the
Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017,
which would allow individuals with concealed-carry
privileges in their state of residence to exercise those
rights in any other state while abiding by that state’s
laws.
The controversial bill would thus function as does a
driver’s license, where out-of-state operators can get
behind the wheel in any state, though they must adhere to
designated speed limits and signs of that jurisdiction,
including obeying gun-free zones.
There are more than 16 million concealed-carry permittees
in the U.S., a figure that soared 256 percent, according to
the Crime Prevention Research Center, under the Obama
administration. Some 6.53 percent of Americans have permits,
and outside of the more rigorously gun-controlled California
and New York, roughly 8 percent of the population has a
permit. The caveat is that all states have some sort of
concealed-carry eligibility. Twelve states no longer require
a permit for concealed carry, and the remaining 38 require a
resident to prove, to varying degrees, a legitimate need to
carry a concealed handgun.
President Trump supports the bill, and with a
GOP-controlled House and Senate, the backers are confident
that it will move through victoriously, despite the very
vocal opposition.
“Since introducing this common sense bill, I have
received an incredible amount of support from folks across
the country,” Hudson told Fox News, adding that it currently
has 207 co-sponsors from both sides of the aisle. “I expect
the Judiciary Committee to take it up when the House comes
back into session in September. We are primed to make
national concealed carry reciprocity for law-abiding
citizens a reality.”
Not so fast, say officials on both coasts.
The California Police Chiefs Association, which
represents municipal police chiefs and their agencies in
state with a membership that oversees public safety for more
than 26 million Californians, adamantly opposes the bill.
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“The bill would erode local control of issuing concealed
carry permits, as the arbitrariness of the issuing authority
rules would reduce the requirements for concealed carry to
the lowest common denominator,” Edward Medrano, the
association’s president asserted in a July 13, 2017, letter.
“Further, the lack of a national database for concealed
carry permits makes it functionally impossible for a law
enforcement officer in the field to determine the legal
compliance of an individual carrying a concealed firearm.”
Similar sentiments come from the U.S. Conference of
Mayors, the “official non-partisan organization of cities
with populations of 30,000 or more, represented by its chief
elected official, the mayor.”
At its annual meeting in late June, New York City Mayor
Bill de Blasio and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel led the
passing of a sweeping resolution that calls on Congress to
repel the “dangerous” legislation that “would essentially
force the localities to give full faith and credit to
permits that are issued on less rigorous grounds” and
“remove local governments’ ability to maintain sensible gun
standards.”
Other officials against the bill, including New York
District Attorney Cy Vance, have even gone as far as to
caution that those backing national reciprocity are enabling
ISIS militants – an argument that proponents of national
reciprocity frame as being just the opposite of such a
policy.
Despite such concerns, the bill has powerful support.
The National Rifle Association has maintained
that the “weak” argument to the legislation from gun
control groups fails to acknowledge that criminals
who carry unlawfully with “evil intent” have no
standards to follow any laws, therefore this is for
the many “law abiding and self-regulating Americans
who have proven themselves to behave responsibly.”
And Gary Byrne, a retired Secret Service officer,
concurred that law enforcement leaders and lawmakers
“need to recognize this is an American right,” and
one that is eminently sensible.
“I will always remember the two times I was in
serious danger of being mugged. I was on my way to
work as a Secret Service Officer at the White House
while I was in civilian clothes,” he recalled. “As
soon as I drew my firearm in defense of my life
against the armed robbers, they turned tail.”
Some also argue that a national concealed-handgun
carry policy is reasonable given the threat of
terrorism.
“National reciprocity arguably makes the entire
United States a harder target and therefore a more
credible deterrent,” said Dennis Santiago, a
California-based risk analyst and firearms
instructor.
Hollie McKay has been a FoxNews.com staff
reporter since 2007. She has reported extensively
from the Middle East on the rise and fall of
terrorist groups such as ISIS in Iraq. Follow her on
twitter at
@holliesmckay
