| More on this story from yesterday. |
Rep. Elijah Cummings
...Representative-for-life from Maryland, representing half of Baltimore City, which makes his district ultra-safe, and most of Howard County, which is out-populated by the city. Cummings' politix are so liberal they're tedious..., D-Md., as well as Sens. Elizabeth
FauxchahontasWarren
...Dem Senatrix from Massachussetts, who traces her noble lineage all the way back to Big Chief Spouting Bull. It has been alleged that she speaks with forked tongue but she denies that...
, D-Mass., and Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, had commissioned the Government Accountability Office report to look into how online private dealers might be selling guns to people not allowed to have them.
Their efforts were based on a 2016 report from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), which claimed that "anonymity of the internet makes it an ideal means for prohibited individuals to obtain illegal firearms."
"Congressional requesters asked that GAO access the extent to which ATF is enforcing existing laws and investigate whether online private sellers sell firearms to be people who are not allowed or eligible to possess a firearm," the GAO report said.
Over the course of the two-and-a-half year investigation, agents tried to buy firearms illegally on the "Surface Web" and the "Dark Web," generally by sharing their status as "prohibited individuals" or trying to buy across state lines.
But the GAO revealed that their 72 attempts outside of the dark web were all "unsuccessful."
"Private sellers on Surface Web gun forums and in classified ads were unwilling to sell a firearm to our agents that self-identified as being prohibited from possessing a firearm," the GAO reported, noting that in their "72 attempts ... 56 sellers refused to complete a transaction once we revealed that either the shipping address was across state lines or that we were prohibited by law from owning firearms." In the other cases, the Sherlocks' website was frozen or they encountered suspected scammers.