Durbin Meets With Giffords, Brady To Discuss Gun Trafficking Amid New Foreign Terrorist Organization Designation By Trump Administration

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, released the following statement after meeting with representatives from gun violence prevention groups GIFFORDS and Brady: United Against Gun Violence:

“Lax gun laws in America are enabling international criminals. Drug cartels are acquiring weapons from our country to help facilitate violence and trafficking around the world. It’s a deadly, vicious cycle—one that we must cut off at its source by strengthening our gun laws.

“We need to explore every solution we can to stop the flow of illegal guns from the United States to Mexico, including leveraging President Trump’s new foreign terrorist organization designations and legislative solutions.

“My Stop Arming Cartels Act would ban the manufacturing and sale of the cartels’ weapon of choice, the .50 caliber rifle, as well as strengthen other tools to combat gun violence. I’m proud to partner with advocates like Giffords and Brady, and it’s time for Congress to protect our homeland and our region by strengthening American gun safety laws.”

A photo of the meeting is available here.

Earlier this year, Durbin introduced the bicameral Stop Arming Cartels Act, which would stem the “iron river” of firearms trafficking from the United States to Mexico, enabled by weak American gun laws and dangerous gun industry practices.

The deadly stream of firearms trafficking exacerbates violence, enables cartels who smuggle migrants to our southern border, and facilitates the illicit trade of narcotics, including fentanyl, across the border back into the United States. According to a 2021 study from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), 70 percent of crime guns recovered in Mexico from 2014-2018 and submitted for tracing were U.S.-sourced.

Specifically, the Stop Arming Cartels Act would:

• Prohibit future nongovernmental manufacture, importation, sale, transfer, or possession of .50 caliber rifles;

• Regulate existing .50 caliber rifles under the National Firearms Act, with a fee waiver and 12-month grace period for registration on the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record for those who lawfully possess them under current law;

• Create an exception to the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), allowing victims of gun violence to sue manufacturers and dealers who engage in firearm transactions prohibited under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (the “Kingpin Act”);

• Prohibit the sale or transfer of firearms to individuals sanctioned under the Kingpin Act and add Kingpin Act designations to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS); and

• Require firearms dealers to report multiple sales of rifles to state and local law enforcement agencies, as they must currently do for handguns.

The bill is co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Andy Kim (D-NJ), Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), Chris Murphy (D-CT), Jack Reed (D-RI), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Peter Welch (D-VT), and Tammy Duckworth (D-IL).

The bill is endorsed by Brady: United Against Gun Violence, Everytown for Gun Safety, GIFFORDS, March for Our Lives, Global Exchange, Global Action on Gun Violence, Amnesty International, and People’s Movement for Peace and Justice.

Bill text is available here. A one-page summary of the bill is available here.

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