Impact of Colorado's Gun Background Check Law Was 'Vastly Overstated'

Even Democrats are questioning whether the Legislature misallocated millions of taxpayer dollars based on the flawed estimate.

A law expanding background check requirements on Colorado gun sales has been in effect for about a year, and an Associated Press analysis of state data compiled during that span shows the projected impact was vastly overstated in a key budget report.

The discovery has prompted a prominent Democratic lawmaker to question whether the Legislature misallocated millions of taxpayer dollars based on the flawed estimate, which has provided an opportunity for Republicans to resume attacks over regulation that already has come at great political cost to Colorado liberals.

Democrats pushed the proposal into law last year as part of a package of gun restrictions meant to improve safety after devastating mass shootings. Lawmakers drafting the background check requirement, aimed at keeping firearms away from those with a criminal history, relied on information from a non-partisan research arm of the Legislature that predicted about 420,000 new reviews over the first two years. Accordingly, they budgeted about $3 million to the agency that conducts the checks to handle the anticipated surge of work.

Comments

[On The Random, Mandelbrot]

Uh, I can't resist; WE TOLD YOU SO, ASSHOLES!! Sorry.

/rave off

[Asok Asus]

"The law also requires checks for online sales, which is new for transactions within Colorado. But such vetting was already required on interstate sales. Still, interstate activity is tallied in the private background check total."

Translation: Federal law has required CBI Instachecks by Federally Licensed Firearms dealers for online firearm purchases from out of state sellers since 1994, which would mean almost ALL online sales have already required background checks. By including these existing interstate transfers in the total, this basically means that almost NONE of the reported total of 13,600 background checks is from intrastate checks required by the new state law, which would be easy enough for an enterprising reporter (yeah, right) to confirm by obtaining this same statistic for the year BEFORE the Colorado laws were implemented.

Also, note that not a single person has been arrested in Colorado for violation of the new magazine-limit law because it is simply unenforceable since there is no way to distinguish a legal magazine from an "illegal" magazine.

These laws DO however serve to turn a large number of Colorado citizens into unknowing criminals who can be selectively prosecuted upon any whim of the government, which is one of the very hallmarks of a fascist government.