Last week, a consortium of House Democratic lawmakers signed a joint letter suggesting violations of some veterans’ Second Amendment rights due to a “mentally incompetent” diagnosis by the Veterans Affairs (VA) rating agencies. The current VA pension regulation, 38 CFR 3.353, defines “mentally incompetent” as “A person is a person who by reason of injury or disease lacks the mental capacity to contract or manage his own affairs, including the disbursement of funds without limitations.”
The “official determination” of mental incompetence is made by VA rating agencies, which have “exclusive authority” in making that determination. According to the regulation, the determination is made for the purposes of insurance and provision of benefits. This regulation does not address “insanity determinations,” as this is the successor code, 38 CFR 3.354, and is not subject to an amendment to the bill.
BREAK
More than 140 Democrats in the House are asking for it @DeptVetAffairs begin using state gun confiscation laws to disarm veterans in response to the law ending the Clinton-era veterans firearms ban that GOA forced Biden to sign last weekend.
See the full letter here.⤵️https://t.co/yLEY85LFjJ pic.twitter.com/WEv1wYSfE4
— Gun Owners of America (@GunOwners) March 15, 2024
The letter from Democratic lawmakers, released by Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA), states:
As members of the Gun Violence Prevention Task Force, we are deeply concerned about Section 413, known as the Kennedy Amendment, which was included in the Senate-passed appropriations bill for Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and related, e
subsequently included in the minibus for six of the 12 government funding projects.…
At a time when veteran suicide remains a terrible crisis, we should not make access to firearms easier for veterans who pose a danger to themselves or others. Perversely, the Kennedy Amendment is not only a threat to veterans’ physical health, but also threatens to place troubled veterans in legal jeopardy. When the VA determines that a veteran is “mentally incompetent,” the veteran automatically becomes a “prohibited purchaser” under long-standing federal regulations, thus making it a crime for the veteran to purchase a firearm. This is true whether the gun is purchased through a private sale or through a licensed dealer, and it is true whether or not the VA has provided information on veterans’ mental status to the NICS.
We urge the Department to take several actions to protect veterans. First, we ask that you commit to creating an automatic process to request a court order for veterans who the Department has deemed mentally incompetent in order to properly add them to the NICS background check system.
Second, we ask that the Department complete a study of veterans designated as “mentally incompetent” and veterans who die by suicide or are involved in gun violence. Understanding the sensitive nature of this information, this report should consist
anonymized numerical data and analysis.
Democrats are referring to Robert Card, the alleged Maine killer who killed 18 people last October. The letter considers Card a “reminder of what can happen when warning signs are not taken seriously.” But Card, as far as has been reported, was not deemed “mentally incompetent.” Indeed, Card was reportedly immobile in the Army Reserves.
However, according to the New York Post, Card era admitted to a psychiatric facility for two weeks the previous summer. This would have been a “yellow flag” (as it is defined in Maine law). TThe ATF form required for background checks before purchasing a gun, Form 4473, explicitly asks: “Have you ever been adjudicated mentally defective Or have you ever been committed to a psychiatric institution?”
In 2014, the ATF changed the definition of “mental[ly] defective” in the sense:
“…people deemed incompetent be tried or not guilty by reason of mental disease or defectlack of mental responsibility, or follyand that the term includes found persons guilty but mentally ill.“
The Democrats who signed this letter call for the violation of Second Amendment rights of veterans that are unmatched by civilian requirements, using a propagandized comparison that is not equivalent. The card should have been marked later be admitted to a psychiatric facilitynot because he couldn’t manage his finances (“mentally incompetent”).
Ironically, Democrats who promote the violation of veterans’ rights without due process are silent when it comes to gender dysphoria, a mental disorder according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. While Democrats believe their rejection of the amendment is aimed at protecting suicidal veterans, they conveniently ignore one of the most vulnerable demographic groups when it comes to self-harm and suicide: the transgender community. A study published in the National Library of Medicine “indicates[s] that 82% of transgender people have considered suicide and 40% have attempted suicide.”
For this reason, this hyper-focused virtue signaling by 138 Democrats seems more like politicization against those sworn to defend our Constitution rather than genuine concern for the well-being of veterans and American society as a whole.