Operation Choke Point: Obama’s Plan to Kill the Second Amendment
I frequently hear liberals claim that people who say the government is going after their guns are just a bunch of conspiracy theorists. They deny that there is any government effort to deny Americans the right to bear arms. I have a different opinion… one that is based upon verifiable facts, rather than on Obama administration talking points.
Not only are liberals trying to ban more and more types of guns through congressional legislation, but we also know that the Obama administration is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to purchase billions and billions of rounds of ammunition from private retailers for government use. This has created a massive ammo shortage across the country, as any gun owner will tell you. It has also jacked up the price of ammunition, forcing gun owners to purchase fewer rounds. Until they can grab our guns, the govt is doing the next best thing: removing access to bullets. You can’t shoot a gun without bullets.
But the newest tactic of the Obama administration is to just put gun retailers out of business altogether. The way that this is done is by using the heavy hand of the US Department of Justice, led by the notorious Attorney General Eric Holder. The DOJ is attacking gun retailers by cutting off their access to bank credit, by unlawfully freezing their assets and by prohibiting online sales.
One of the most successful DOJ schemes is Operation Choke Point. Since 2011, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) has given banks new rules regarding who they may lend money to. They are threatening banks with investigations, audits and deeper scrutiny if they provide loans or credit lines to gun retailers. This ploy effectively leads to gun stores having to close their doors because their access to lines of credit have been choked off. The government doesn’t care if the gun retailers have perfect credit histories, valid licenses and comply fully with the law. All gun retailers are considered “high risk” and, as such, find themselves in the government’s crosshairs.
Peter Weinstock, a lawyer at Hunton and Williams, said: “This administration has very clearly told the banking industry which customers they feel represent ‘reputational risk’ to do business with. So financial institutions are reacting to this extraordinary enforcement arsenal by being ultra-conservative in who they do business with: Any companies that engage in any margin of risk as defined by this administration are being dropped.”
Last month, Top Gun Firearms and Training and Supply, based in Miami, FL, was dumped by its local bank. A letter to the gun retailer from the bank read, “”This letter in no way reflects any derogatory reasons for such action on your behalf. But rather one of industry. Unfortunately your company’s line of business is not commensurate with the industries we work with.”
And there are hundreds of gun retailers around the country that are reporting the exact same situation.
Joe Siochman, who owns American Spirit Arms, explains, “At first, it was the bigger guys — gun parts manufacturers or high-profile retailers. Now the smaller mom-and-pop shops are being choked out, and they need their cash to buy inventory. Freezing their assets will put them out of business.”
It isn’t just the retailers who are angry. Several major banking associations are speaking out against the government hit job.
In last month’s issue of AMERICAN BANKER, senior vice president of the American Bankers Association, Richard Riese, wrote: “We’re being threatened with a regulatory regime that attempts to foist on us the obligation to monitor all types of transactions. All of this is predicated on a notion that the banks are a choke point for all businesses.”
A prominent association for smaller banks, The Independent Community Bankers of America, also expressed outrage at the behavior of the Obama administration and Eric Holder’s Justice Department. The association’s president, Camden Fine, sent a letter to the DOJ in April. It read, in part:
“While preventing fraud is a top concern for community banks, it needs to be balanced with ensuring that businesses and consumers that operate in accordance with applicable laws can still access payment systems. ICBA requests that the DOJ suspend Operation Choke Point immediately and focus its resources directly on businesses that may be violating the law, rather than targeting banks providing payment services.”
So, while I empathize with the difficulty that American liberals face in trying to infringe upon their neighbor’s rights to bear arms, I must vehemently disagree with their claim that there is no government effort to grab guns or to otherwise impede the Second Amendment. Not all of us are willing to swallow the official government line.
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I’m a machinist and I understand chemistry, I cannot be disarmed.