We reported in a previous post that the U.S. House of Representatives voted to block a regulation put in place by the Obama Administration that prevented an estimated 75,000 people who are receiving Social Security disability benefits due to mental health disorders from purchasing firearms. Unfortunately, the U.S. Senate has followed the House’s lead and voted 57-43 to block this regulation.
Now, the last line of defense for upholding this regulation falls upon President Donald Trump, but Trump is expected to sign the measure and allow these mentally disabled people to be able to purchase firearms.
It is not a complete surprise the Senate voted this way as Republicans have a clear majority in both houses of Congress, but there were actually some Democrats who joined the Republicans in supporting the blockage of this regulation. As we said in the previous blog, the National Rifle Association (NRA) was lobbying members of Congress hard to block this regulation. The power of this group seems to have no limits and now they are looking to add 75,000 new members to their organization.
The reason the Obama put this regulation in place is that the people impacted suffer from mental health disorders so severe they have been determined to be not only disabled, but unable to manage their own finances because Social Security required them to have a payee to manage Social Security payments.
Obviously this vote by the Senate did not receive a lot of attention, probably because the Trump Administration saw its National Security advisor resign less than a month after taking over the post, but this is something that Americans should be aware of, especially those who are concerned about gun violence. We have said this before, but it is necessary to repeat, why would we want guns in the hands of people suffering from mental health disabilities so severe they are unable to manage something as simple as their own Social Security payments?
