FACT CHECK

Reid’s PAC continues misinformation campaign against Dr. Joe Heck

Latest Ad Exposes the Left’s Habit of Using a Tragedy for Political Gain

“Senate Majority PAC’s latest ad against Dr. Joe Heck is riddled with inaccuracy, misinformation, and flawed logic,” said Brian Baluta, spokesperson for the Dr. Joe Heck for U.S. Senate campaign. “But this is what we have come to expect from a PAC run by associates and former staffers of Harry Reid. Dr. Heck is the only candidate in the race with the real-world experience necessary to keep Nevadans safe and secure and no amount of deceitful advertising is going to change that.”

CLAIM: Dr. Heck voted 23 times against banning those on the terrorist watch from buying guns.

FACT: During late 2015 and the first half of 2016, the “no fly, no buy” bill (H.R. 1076) was Democrats’ procedural bill of choice for politicizing work being conducted in the House. The votes cited in this ad are all procedural motions (Previous Question, Motion to Recommit, or a Tabling of the Ruling of the Chair) used by the Democrat minority to score political points. All of the votes are along party lines, demonstrating that no member of the House views the vote as a serious policy question. In fact, these procedural tactics are used with the creation of exactly this type of advertisement in mind.

CLAIM: Individuals on the FBI terror watch list have purchased firearms over 2,000 times.

FACT: Here the ad cites a Washington Post article which references a Government Accountability Report (GAO) that tracked gun purchases as recorded by the FBI. What the ad leaves out is that 1) none of those guns have ever been used in a crime and 2) the number cited is a 10 year total (2004 through 2014).

For reference, a chart under the heading “Gun sales to people on the terror watchlist are a tiny portion of all sales” can be seen by clicking here. The chart shows that the number of terror watch matches are a minuscule amount relative to overall sales.

So what is going on with this ad?
Rahm Emmanuel probably said it best: “You never let a good crisis go to waste.”

Ad Uses Misinformation to Scare Voters
In the wake of the San Bernardino shootings, Americans were rightly focused on the need to reduce gun violence and some were probably scared that their community might be next.

This ad wants to play on the fears of those viewers by leading them to believe that the “no-fly, no-buy” policy would make a meaningful impact on reducing gun violence. Unfortunately for the Democrat’s narrative, there simply isn’t any proof that it’s true.

For starters, non-US citizens - the majority of people on these various lists - are already prohibited from buying a firearm. The FBI no-fly list and the FBI-maintained “TSA selectee list” contain just under 3,000 American citizens. So that is 3,000 Americans who, under this “no-fly, no-buy” legislation would have a Constitutional right striped from them with no due process of law. And some of them may be wrongly on those lists, as the American Civil Liberties Union explained in stating their opposition to the bill:

“At the same time, regulation of firearms and individual gun ownership or use must be consistent with civil liberties principles, such as due process, equal protection, freedom from unlawful searches, and privacy.”

The ACLU goes on to state: “Our nation’s watchlisting system is error-prone and unreliable because it uses vague and overbroad criteria and secret evidence to place individuals on blacklists without a meaningful process to correct government error and clear their names.”

FBI opposed “no-fly, no-buy,” said it would hurt investigations
In 2015, FBI Director James B. Comey told Congress that denying sales could “blow” his agents’ investigations into potential terrorists.

However, by 2016, the political machine at the Justice Department decided to overrule Comey, saying they now back the policy.

Media exposes flawed logic behind “no-fly, no-buy”
Even the mainstream media has pointed out the flaws in the logic used in this attack, not that Harry Reid’s PAC would let something like flawed logic slow their attacks against Dr. Heck. Here is just one example from NBC News:

‘No Fly, No Buy’ Has Political Momentum, But May Have Little Impact

“But many experts question whether the so-called “no fly, no buy” approach would be effective, noting that it would not have prevented several of the most grisly recent mass shootings in Orlando, Florida; San Bernardino, California; and Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

“The reason: None of the attackers were among the more than 1.1 million people on the government’s databases of suspected terrorists, including those with potential extremist ties banned from flying while under investigation.”

Heck has record of supporting measures to actually reduce gun violence
Instead, Dr. Joe Heck supports actual policies that could have an immediate effect on reducing gun violence. Heck supports:

- increased funding for states to get all records into the NICS background check system.

- prosecuting those who illegally attempt to purchase and straw-man purchasers.

- increase access to and funding for mental health services.

But you won’t hear Democrats talk about these ideas because they don’t see an opportunity to exploit these policies for political gain.

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