GAO study on Mexican violence promotes misinformation of firearms trafficking

The General Accounting Office (GAO) of the United States has released a study on firearms trafficking and violence in Mexico.

The report, which NSSF is still reviewing, appears to be rife with error.  Consider the following claim: “According to U.S. and Mexican government officials, these firearms have been increasingly more powerful and lethal in recent years. For example, many of these firearms are high-caliber and high-powered, such as AK and AR-15 type semiautomatic rifles.”

These rifles, of course, are no more “powerful” or “lethal” than any other lawful rifle, and they fire ammunition that is considerably less powerful than other hunting rifles.

The report has also led to a revival of false allegations regarding recovered firearms in Mexico.  As the trade association for the firearms industry, we believe it is important to set the record straight (and separate fact from fiction):

Some 29,000 firearms were recovered in Mexico last year, of which approximately 5,000 were traced to U.S. sources.  That means more than 80 percent of the firearms recovered in Mexico were not traced to the United States. Furthermore, according to the ATF, those firearms traced were originally sold at retail not recently, but on average 14 years earlier. This is completely inconsistent with any notion that a flood of newly purchased firearms are being illegally smuggled over the border into Mexico. And let's not forget, no retail firearms sale can be made in the U.S. until after a criminal background check on the purchaser has been completed.

In recent years as many as 150,000 Mexican soldiers, 17,000 last year alone, defected to go work for the drug cartels -- bringing their American-made service-issued firearms with them. It has also been well documented that the drug cartels are illegally smuggling fully automatic firearms, grenades and other weapons into Mexico from South and Central America. Such items are not being purchased at retail firearms stores in the United States.

It should be noted, even the Department of Homeland Security (following a review of the GAO report) found the statistics cited to be misleading. The Department specifically called into question the GAO claim that "87 percent of firearms seized by Mexican authorities and traced over the past 5 years originated in the United States." The DHS responded to this claim by saying, "DHS officials believe that the 87 percent statistic is misleading as the reference should include the number of weapons that could not be traced. Numerous problems with the data collection and sample population render this assertion as unreliable (page 69)."

Although it’s understandable that Mexican authorities and sympathetic American agencies are frustrated with cartel-related violence, it is wrong for anyone to blame the Second Amendment and America’s firearms industry for those problems.

Members of the firearms industry take seriously the criminal acquisition and misuse of their products. This is why our industry supports the Southwest Border Violence Reduction Act of 2009, sponsored by Sen. Bingaman (D-NM), and will continue to work cooperatively with law enforcement. For nearly a decade, our industry has partnered with the ATF in a national campaign called Don’t Lie for the Other Guy that makes the public aware that it is a serious crime to illegally straw purchase a firearm. The program also helps ATF to educate firearms retailers to be better able to detect and prevent illegal straw purchases. Senior executives from NSSF will be continuing the acclaimed Don’t Lie campaign next week in both the Rio Grande Valley (Texas) and Houston (Texas).

Going through the full GAO report will take some time, but no one should be under any illusions; from what we’ve read so far, facts take a backseat to unfounded allegations and hyperbole.

Comments

[Ronald Smithson]

Dear Sir,

I just would like to add some comments to this article from what I have experienced in this issue:

“And let's not forget, no retail firearms sale can be made in the U.S. until after a criminal background check on the purchaser has been completed”
Believing a system is that perfect is in fact is an illusion, it will always be somebody that will find a way to break the laws. Black weapon market is indeed a huge industry. It is not promoting a system failure; it is just acknowledging the reality.

“In recent years as many as 150,000 Mexican soldiers, 17,000 last year alone, defected to go work for the drug cartels -- bringing their American-made service-issued firearms with them”. We may speculate about the figures and about final destination of firearms, the truth is that the number of American firearms in use by the Mexican army represent a minor percentage since they do use German made weapons which in most of the cases these weapons are more than 20 to 30 years old such that they need NDT inspection to verify their reliability.

“The DHS responded to this claim by saying, "DHS officials believe that the 87 percent statistic is misleading as the reference should include the number of weapons that could not be traced”
“Senior executives from NSSF will be continuing the acclaimed Don’t Lie campaign next week in both the Rio Grande Valley (Texas) and Houston (Texas).”

How much informed we are? How much knowledge and experience we do have about the issue?
In a global atmosphere, it may suggest studying what others countries legislation implies about firearms, Mexican legislation is extremely hard on this topic. Why do I care about that if it is not my problem? Because we just simply break the law all the times, but, how come?.... do you know that there are a number of parts that can not cross the border to the south and they do require permits in both sides of the border to go there? Do you know that our industrial and commercial sectors help promoting illegal introduction of controlled materials to the south side just by shipping to Mexican people who have an address in the US border cities? Do we even know that even on the internet there are US commercial sites that affirm that they do have their commercial branches in Mexico to commercialize controlled materials by Mexican Law and that they are illegally introduced to this country: This is published to everybody on the net!!!
Then, why we do affirm that statistics are misleading and we will continue to acclaim our don’t lie campaign if we are not aware about our own truth?

The situation has reach by now US border cities, just ask to rangers at Laredo and McAllen, TX they may have a different opinion in how drug cartels are “passing by their cities”. I really don’t want it to be in front of my home in the near future.

May be we may think is somebody else problem or may be we may think all the information “be rife with error” and misleading or maybe we may believe all is a political issue but, may be the political issue, the somebody else problem, the rife with error information is by now in American soil, becoming our problem, our political issue and our responsibility to find the truth behind the information to preserve our freedom.

Sincerely,

Ronald Smithson.

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