Today Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Democrat from Nevada, will hold the first procedural vote on major gun control legislation since 1993. Compromise seems to be in the air, as Senators Pat Toomey (R-PA) and Joe Manchin (D-WV), indicated in a joint press conference yesterday.
“I’m a gun owner, and the rights that are enshrined in the second amendment are very, very important to me personally, as I know they are to so many people across Pennsylvania,” Senator Toomey said. “My record shows this, but I gotta tell you candidly, I don’t consider criminal background checks to be gun control. I think it’s just common sense.”
Senator Manchin echoed these sentiments. Gun owners in West Virginia, he said, “understand this is common sense. This is gun sense. We’re not infringing on your rights as an individual citizen. But, basically, if you’re going to go to a gun show you should be subjected the same [background checks] as if you went to the gun store.”
Both Toomey and Manchin have earned an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association, but for Steve Onufrey, a Pennsylvania gun owner and member of the Concerned Gun Owners of Bucks County, that “A” isn’t enough to earn his trust on Toomey’s proposals.