Rule could keep guns from Social Security disability recipients, and it's taking heat

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Debate in the nation's capital this week will be about keeping firearms from people who may be linked to terrorism, a result of the brutal June 12 shooting attack on an Orlando nightclub. But behind the scenes, thousands of Americans are agitated over a different gun rule in the works -- to keep guns from certain Social Security recipients.

The idea is not to take guns from retirees, although many gun-rights advocates say they suspect that's President Barack Obama's real goal.

Rather, a regulation quietly proposed in May would help bar certain Social Security disability recipients with mental-illness issues -- about 75,000 each year, the White House says -- from legally buying firearms.

Authorities already can block certain people with mental illnesses from buying weapons at gun stores. But the federal database with their names, which dealers are supposed to check before selling a gun, is only as good as the information state, local and federal agencies provide. The Social Security Administration, unlike the Veterans Administration, doesn't provide its mental-illness lists.

Read more: http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2016/06/social_security_gun-ban_propos.html

Cross-posted in the Gun Control Reform Activism Group.