Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Roosevelt Island's Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney Reports Office Received Death Threats Yesterday Over Gun Insurance Bill She Authored


Received the following statement today from Roosevelt Island's Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney:
Yesterday, several death threats were phoned into my New York office in response to news reports about a bill I authored requiring gun owners to have insurance. The calls were fielded by young interns, who were understandably shaken by this experience.

Law enforcement has been notified and they are investigating the calls, and so no further comment from me on the details of the calls would be appropriate at this time

I am proud of my work to help curb gun violence. I strongly support the comprehensive package of gun reforms proposed by the Obama Administration and I have authored two common sense pieces of legislation aimed at keeping our communities safer. One bill would put some teeth in the law against gun trafficking and straw purchases. Another would require that gun owners carry liability insurance, just like car owners, to give innocent victims of gun violence some recourse if they are injured. 100,000 Americans are injured by guns every year. Carrying insurance is the responsible thing to do.

Given all the acts of gun violence we have seen in the past two years, the shootings in Aurora and Newtown, the attack on my friend and colleague Gabby Gifford, I take the threat of more gun violence very seriously. But it is not something that I will allow to stop me from doing my work.
According to the Daily Caller:
When New York Rep. Carolyn Maloney introduced the legislation last month with eight other Democrats, she boasted that it is “the first bill to require liability insurance of gun buyers nationwide.”

Maloney’s “Firearm Risk Protection Act” requires gun buyers to have “a qualified liability insurance policy” before they are able to legally purchase a firearm....

... Chris Cox, the executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, told The Daily Caller that the bill is “ridiculous on its face, as it presumes law-abiding gun owners are guilty for merely exercising a fundamental, constitutional right.”...
Click here for the entire Daily Caller article and here's more from Congresswoman Maloney on background checks for gun owners with NBC's Chuck Todd.

3 comments :

CheshireKitty said...

Unfortunately the bad guys obtain guns in non-regulated ways, such as on a cash basis, with no background check or ins needed. There are too many guns floating around in our society; moreover, firearm ownership is a deeply ingrained custom, and right. The pols should continue to chip away at it, though, considering the mayhem and tragedy guns enable.

William Sinclair said...

Totally in favor of liability insurance for gun buyers and owners. Thank you Carolyn Maloney.

CheshireKitty said...

Did Maloney's bill make it out of the House? Was it part of the bill that was voted down in the Senate?