House lawmakers denied an effort to repeal a 19-year-old prohibition on gun research on the same day that a leading gun control proponent doubted anything will get done on the issue.
The House Appropriations Committee voted 32-19 Wednesday largely along party lines to shoot down an amendment on funding gun research in a spending bill. A majority of Democrats have argued that research won’t impinge gun-owner rights but Republicans were not so sure.
The vote comes a week after the racially-motivated shooting deaths of nine people in Charleston, S.C.
In 1996, the House prohibited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from funding any types of gun research. The prohibition was to prevent any activities such as data collection for current and future research that could be used to take away guns or ammunition or create a list of gun owners.
A House appropriations bill for the CDC and other government agencies upheld the prohibition, and Democrats unsuccessfully tried to remove it.
Democrats on the panel said there is no harm in performing research.
They noted that the amendment is not about creating a registry of gun owners or confiscating firearms.
“This amendment is about research and nothing more,” said Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., the amendment’s sponsor.
Most Democrats said the research would help to “prevent violence while still protecting the rights of gun owners,” according to Rep. David E. Price, D-N.C.
The CDC could do research on helpful topics such as how to properly store a gun, Democrats on the panel said.
But Republicans on the panel were not swayed.
“This prohibition has been in this bill since 1996. It is striking to me that neither side, and they have both been in the majority, has seen fit to repeal it,” said Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla. “We don’t think this place is the appropriate place for a debate over the Second Amendment.”
The measure looks to be one of the few, if any, gun provisions considered by Congress this session. Gun-control advocate Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., said Wednesday on MSNBC that there aren’t any votes planned in the Senate for expanding background checks.
