Here’s the Staggering Number of People on the Terror Watchlist Who Were Approved to Buy Guns

[TexasBushwhacker]

http://usuncut.com/news/fbi-terror-watchlist-gun-sales-approved/


"A troubling report from the Government Accountability Office shows that 91 percent of people on the FBI terror watchlist were approved for gun sales in 2015."


Granted, the Orlando shooter was no longer on a watch list, nor were the San Bernardino shooters or the Boston Bombers. However, this is just nuts.

[davidn3600]

1. The first problem is no one knows what it takes to be put on these watch lists

The FBI doesn't disclose that info.

So do we start restricting people's constitutional rights when they have committed no crime but remain on some secret government list?

[librarylu]

2. Do you want those people

to use their constitutional rights to buy guns?

Are they part of a well-regulated militia?

[leveymg]

5. To the NRA, ISIS is a "well-regulated militia." Any armed gun nuts qualify.

Literally.

[librarylu]

11. I was thinking that too.

I don't know how well-regulated ISIS is but they're pretty effective.

States were given the right by the 2nd to raise militias to put down slave rebellions but we don't have many of those anymore.

I wonder how using the market would work? Maybe putting pressure on advertisers to not air their filthy, gun-glorifying ads, boycotting stores that carry guns, writing to corporations such as Walmart about having weapons openly displayed so close to the bicycles. Maybe some good old-fashioned shunning would be helpful.

I'd like to see a ban on 2nd Amendment T-shirts, myself. I used to have to sell the damned things when I worked in a shop whose owner was, I think, a member of the NRA. The shop carried concealed carry purses for awhile, too. They were popular with elderly out-of-shape ladies from Miami who were going to protect themselves from muggers. What, I would wonder as I was making the sale, happens when someone snatches the purse?

Making gun ownership socially unacceptable might be more effective than trying to force law-abiding citizens to obey laws.

[Lee-Lee]

8. I don't know- who are they and why are they on the list?

Do you know?

Or are you just assuming it's a perfect list?

Remember- Senator Ted Kennedy found himself on the No-Fly list and was hassled for almost a month every time he tried to fly because it took them several weeks to fix the error. If a Senator like him can end up on the list it's clearly a flawed process, and if it takes 3-4 weeks for him to get removed how long would it take a person with no money or influence?

[HereSince1628]

10. I don't law enforcement to immediately assume anyone is one of 'those' people

The use of "those" suggests broad-brushing that is in itself dangerous.

And I especially don't want to assume that someone is dangerous because they have a name that matches a name on a list.

These lists are pretty rotten. The application of reasoning that involves "an excess of caution" tends to cast very large nets, that not only have low efficiencies for protecting the public but also risk doing very real and possibly irrevocable damage to people's lives.

People have the right to equal protections free from unwarranted prior-restraint. If a person hasn't commited a behavior that warrants there being on NICs list of prohibited purchases, preventing a person from buying a weapon is an act of prior-restraint. That requires a high standard to prevent abuse, I don't think 'an excess of caution" is friendly to that concept.

[ancianita]

13. We've had leaked guidelines since 2014. Read Jeremy Scahill's "The Assassination Complex."

The first three chapters lay out the structures and procedures about the Watch Lists. The whole book is quite detailed and eye-opening.

The 19 agency list that contains classified info, also lists 21,000 Americans out of over 1 million people, is called the TIDE Watchlist.

That broad list is the source of other lists -- the no-fly list, the FBI's Terrorist Screening Database, TSDB.

All lists originate by a Nominating Agency, which can use basic Internet info, state ID's and biometric evidence to identify people based on 'reasonable suspicion' criteria that those people's communications, travel and actions give them.

[pipoman]

3. Depriving of rights without due process isn't liberal or progressive.

Or constitutional...

[Just reading posts]

4. Due process. Just sayin'.

[Duckhunter935]

6. Secret Bush FBI lists

No due process, innocent until proven guilty, how democratic, just saying

It's been a year, how many have committed mass murder with those weapons?

[Lee-Lee]

7. The answer that protects civil liberties is to establish due process to get that fixed

Just saying you can't buy a gun because somehow your name ended up on the list sets a very dangerous precident.

What other rights are you willing to deny based on someone putting your name on a list without an clue how? What if states establish a "voter fraud watch list" and put any person on they suspect may possibly somehow be connected with voter fraud.

When a person is banned from buying a firearm due to mental disability there was a legal process that adjudicated them a mental defective. It varies depending on state and how it's initiated, but in every instance they are given notice and have a right to present a defense if they wish and also to appeal.

If the people on a watch list are so dangerous buying a gun should be barred than establish that same sort of procedure if there is no crime they have committed you can charge them with.

[greymattermom]

9. Maybe just argue that it should be reversed

If you are approved to buy a gun, you can't be on the terror watch list. That might make some people think again.

[ecstatic]

12. Chilling. Wish we could see which states were involved. :( nt