UPDATE: The text of the bill has been released, and it appears that the Washington Post‘s report was incorrect. I have published a separate post explaining the full details of this part of the bill here.
Mike DeBonis reports:
NEW DETAILS on gun bill w/ @LACaldwellDC…
-bf loophole language includes automatic rights restoral after 5yrs
-under-21 gun buyers will have to wait at least 3 days, perhaps 10
-text to be filed this afternoon; first procedural vote as soon as tonighthttps://t.co/5OtH3goP36— Mike DeBonis (@mikedebonis) June 21, 2022
If this is correct, the bill is a catastrophe. The Republicans who negotiated this deal — “deal” — may see adding a federal waiting period for under-21-year-olds as a narrow exception to the general rule, but the Democrats will not. Within an hour of that measure becoming law, the Chris Murphys of the world will start calling it the “waiting period loophole” and asking in faux confusion why we apply it to Americans aged 18 to 21 but not to everyone else. And the press, of course, will follow suit.
Worse yet, the GOP will have helped set the precedent that the federal government may micromanage the purchasing process. The 1993 Brady Bill contained a waiting period, but it was valid only until the instant-background-check system was ready, and then it immediately disappeared. This would restore that system for a subset of buyers. At present, the federal government’s role in regulating firearms purchases is limited to running checks. Once expanded, it will be extremely tough to put it back in its proper place. Is that what John Cornyn wants?