From the horses fucking mouth:
POSITION: As a way to strengthen the Brady background check system, the Brady Campaign supports closing the Terror Gap.
PROBLEM: There is a gaping hole in our nation’s firearm laws that terrorists can exploit. Federal authorities can’t stop sales of guns – including military-style assault weapons – by federally licensed gun dealers to known or suspected terrorists because of gaps in current law. Our definitions of those prohibited from purchasing guns from federally licensed dealers do not include those known and suspected terrorists.
[…]
SOLUTION: Congress must pass the bill to close the Terror Gap to stop known or suspected terrorists from buying guns.
GET ACTIVE: Contact your Representative and Senators to urge them to support the Terror Gap bill.
I’ve been completely opposed to this because many innocent people appear on those lists. Now we’ve learned that the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) has been permitted to leave people acquitted of terrorist-related offenses on their lists:
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is permitted to include people on the government’s terrorist watch list even if they have been acquitted of terrorism-related offenses or the charges are dropped, according to newly released documents.
[…]
The 91 pages of newly disclosed files include a December 2010 guidance memorandum to F.B.I. field offices showing that even a not-guilty verdict may not always be enough to get someone off the list, if agents maintain they still have “reasonable suspicion” that the person might have ties to terrorism.
There you have it, if your name appears on the list and you’re later acquitted the FBI can simply leave your name on there so long as they have “reasonable suspicion.” This means, beyond any doubt, that what anti-gunners are advocating is the removal of people’s right to keep and bear arms even if those people are innocent of any crime.
You know what’s rather funny about this? I’ve been saying due process is dead in this country for a while now and am often called paranoid for it. This document proves without any doubt that due process is in fact dead in this country. Welcome to the United Police State of America.
By the way, in case this document gets removed I’ve uploaded a copy to my server, which can be accessed here [PDF].