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Scheunemann Lobbied Against Bill to Keep Guns From Terrorists
We knew Randy Scheunemann, John McCain's top foreign policy adviser, was into guns. After all, in 1997 he was arrested for having a shotgun and several rounds of ammunition in his car on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol. And in addition to his extensive lobbying work on behalf of former Soviet bloc countries, he's also a longtime lobbyist for gun-rights groups. But it now looks like, for Scheunemann, doing the bidding of the gun lobby takes precedence over efforts to combat terrorism.
Newsweek reports that, according to registration documents filed by Scheuenemann's lobbying firm, Orion Strategies, Scheunemann lobbied on behalf of the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) against a bill that aims to close a gun-control loophole that inhibits the government from stopping people on terrorist watch-lists from buying guns. According to Newsweek, "the bill was inspired by an official audit covering a five-month period in 2004 which found that, because of the loophole, the Feds had to greenlight 35 out of 44 cases where a gun buyer was on a terrorist watch list."
The bill, which is backed by the Bush Justice Department, was introduced last year by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), but has been held up in committee. It has since faced stiff opposition from the gun lobby, an aide to Lautenberg told TPMmuckraker, and has yet to come to a vote.
According to lobby disclosure reports, Scheunemann's firm was paid $120,000 by NSSF in 2007, and another $60,000 so far this year. Scheunemann himself took a leave of absence from the firm earlier this year to work on McCain's campaign.
Sen. McCain has not taken a position on the bill. His campaign would not tell Newsweek whether he supports it, or whether Scheunemann had ever lobbied McCain on gun-control issues.
Josh
Zachary
This is great - we (as a country) think that allowing dangerous people access to the passenger compartment of an airplane is worse than allowing them to purchase guns (even now that the assault weapons ban has expired). No wonder the rest of the world think we're insane.
August 26, 2008 11:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is the same 'terrorist watch list' that contains over a million names and prevents millions more who happen to have the same name from boarding airplanes?
We've all been bitching about this stupid list for YEARS and complaining that it's asinine, unfair, heavy-handed and provides no real security. And yet you are complaining that someone lobbied against using that same utterly flawed list to prevent law-abiding people from purchasing weapons?
This is the height of hypocrisy for TPM. I am really disappointed, because you folks so rarely stoop to this sort of thing.
August 26, 2008 12:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree w/Biltud, Dauntless.
It's not hypocrisy when Mr. Roth is simply pointing out the inconsistent and possibly venal behavior of people like Scheunemann who wholeheartedly believe in the watch list and the reasons given for it, yet at the same take money to keep the very same people from getting guns easily.
And on the practical side, learning of your presence on the Watch List at the local gun shop is not nearly as likely to cause disruption as learning about it at the airport.
August 26, 2008 2:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, but getting on an airplane isn't in the constitution - the right to possess guns is.
Leaving aside the debate about guns, it is somewhat chilling to think that we would allow constitutional rights to be removed from individuals without their knowledge, due process, or recourse. If we are willing to accept this, why would it stop there? Shouldn't people on the terrorist watch list also be prevented from spreading their hate by speaking freely?
This is a BAD BAD BAD piece of legislation!
August 27, 2008 3:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
McCain has a serious terrorism problem if everyone would quit ignoring it.
McCain repeatedly voted against federal legislation banning domestic terrorism against patients, doctors, and staff of abortion and women's health clinics.
Also, McCain asked convicted felon G. Gordon Liddy — who has advocated killing federal agents and said Adolf Hitler gave him strength — to host a fundraiser for him in 1998.
August 26, 2008 12:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
"This is the height of hypocrisy for TPM. I am really disappointed, because you folks so rarely stoop to this sort of thing."
JLanders, I think you are missing the point here. This is not TPM's hypocrisy, but McCain's and the Bush administration's.
The list is obviously unfair, it has random names on it and seems to have been cobbled together arbitrarily.
But the people who have put it together and enforced it are now bowing down to the gun lobby. If the people on the list are indeed too dangerous to fly, so much so that according to our president they can wreak havoc with nothing more than box cutters and can put our entire country at risk -- why on earth allow them to buy guns?
Either they have a standard and they stick to it, or they don't. The point is, they don't.
August 26, 2008 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well well, looke here. Zack got a new job! I guess he is crawling his way back up after being fired ... er forced to resigned .... um quit from the NY Observer.
Looks like I have a new place to Fisk you.
August 26, 2008 12:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
It looks like McCain wants to give guns to terrorists. If he didn't, he'd say so, right? The terrorism connections are piling up, my friends. Like his campaign manager said, "Terrorism helps McCain."
August 26, 2008 1:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
he's in Ashcroft territory - or did y'all forget 'the gun sales records must be immediately destroyed!' gambit of 02 ?
http://www.reason.com/news/show/28334.html
tasty - excellent work TPM !
August 26, 2008 1:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wow, great find. McCain's campaign literally aiding terrorists.
August 26, 2008 1:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Biltud,
Neither Scheunemann not McCain put together the no-fly list or were responsible for enforcing it. There is no double standard here. The people who put together the list and have enforced it at airports are the Bush Administration, which supports the legislation to use that list to bar people on it from purchasing guns. Bush and his people *support* expanded use of the list and have not 'bowed down to the gun lobby' as you suggest.
So where is the hypocrisy? Only here at TPM, where I'm seeing intelligent people who have long opposed the no-fly list throwing their good judgment out the window for the sake of a non-sensical political attack.
Punishment of people who have not even been *charged* with any crime, let alone been convicted of one, is morally wrong and runs contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution. Taking away someone's rights, whether the right to travel and board an airplane or to purchase a firearm, cannot be justified on such an arbitrary basis in which there is no due process of law.
August 26, 2008 2:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
You don't get it, Dauntless. Pointing out hypocrisy and explaining why it's hypocrisy isn't hypocritical.
August 26, 2008 2:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree that Zachary Roth is way over the line here with such breathless zingers as "doing the bidding of the gun lobby takes precedence over efforts to combat terrorism." Please. Since when does anybody here believe the worthless "terrorist watch list" is a valid "counter terrorist effort"?!
It's surprising to think that now TPM (ok, Mr. Roth) is endorsing an expansion of this horrible Bush policy. I expect this sort of thing out of folks like Scheunemann, but am disturbed to see it on display here.
Some in this thread have said basically that the author was "merely pointing out the hypocrisy" -- but in my view, a fair reading shows that he's doing it in a similar manner to how Fox News "merely points things out": with a wink and a nod. Shameful; we're better than that.
August 26, 2008 3:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, if I were a terrorist I'd like to have a gun. So on the basis of this article the federal gov't has implied a maximum possible number of people who should be on terrorist watch lists of 44.
Now we can do away with the million name no-fly list and the entirety of the TSA.
August 26, 2008 11:04 PM | Reply | Permalink