Mike Cloud: “What we are considering here today with H.R. 8 has been dubbed a universal background check bill, but in reality, it…”

“What we are considering here today with H.R. 8 has been dubbed a universal background check bill, but in reality, it would criminalize--let me say that again--it would criminalize the private transfer of firearms. As part of the march to strip Americans of their guaranteed Second Amendment right, this gun control bill would make it a crime to sell or transfer a firearm without first seeking permission from the almighty Government. The dirty secret is that the proponents of gun control, Mr. Speaker, want you to think that this is the end of the road when, in fact, that is not true. In 2013 President Obama's Department of Justice's National Institute of Justice said that the effectiveness of universal background checks depends on requiring gun registration. So what we are witnessing here today is the first step to requiring a nationwide gun registration in America. The Second Amendment to the Constitution says: ``A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.'' In this Nation of ``We the People,'' we recognize that we as citizens are not subjects of our government and that our inalienable rights are not a grant from the government but a gift from God, and to that end the Second Amendment doesn't grant us a right, but rather those carefully crafted words acknowledge an already existing right: the right of the people to possess a firearm.…”