Representative Margaret Good files background check bill

Representative Margaret Good (D-72) filed her first bill, HB 135, which would require background checks for all gun purchases in the state. This legislation would require all gun sales or other firearms transfers to go through a licensed dealer, who would facilitate the background check. Currently, private, unlicensed sellers are able to transfer ownership of a firearm without the buyer undergoing a background check. Representative Good brought a similar background check amendment to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act during the 2018 legislative session, which was voted down on party lines, even though 96% of Florida voters support requiring background checks for every gun purchase, according to a February 2018 Quinnipiac University poll. Background checks are proven to be effective in reducing gun violence and deaths. States that require background checks for gun sales saw a 52% reduction in mass shootings between January 2009 and July 2015 compared with states that do not. In states that require background checks for every gun purchase, 47% fewer women are shot to death by their intimate partners; there are 47% fewer firearm suicides; and 53% fewer law enforcement officers are shot to death by handguns. Simply put, background checks save lives. “I was sworn into office on February 14, 2018, moments before the MSD shooting,” said Rep. Good. “On that day, gun violence became a part of my story in a real and personal way.  I have done the research: states that require background checks have fewer instances of gun related violence.  Overwhelmingly, Floridians support this policy.  It is our responsibility as legislators to represent the interests of our constituents and do what is in the best interests of the people of our state.  It’s time the state legislature listens to Floridians and enact common-sense gun legislation that will protect citizens at school, work, houses of worship, and in their own homes.” “Background checks are key to a safer Florida,” said Carol Conyne Rescigno, president of the Sarasota County Chapter of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “Ninety percent of Americans favor these safeguards, yet one in five guns is sold without one due to loopholes such as internet sales.  It’s past time for this bill to be enacted in our state.”  “Florida’s existing background check system doesn’t have a loophole, it has as expressway,” said Jon Harris Maurer of the Florida Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence. “We all want to keep Floridians safe, and Representative Good’s bill is a commons sense, widely supported approach to ensuring that firearms aren’t being sold to dangerous individuals with no oversight from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.”  “As the local spokesperson in Sarasota County for “Sandy Hook Promise”, a non-profit foundation that works tirelessly to put its free programs in schools and teach students to be alert to threats of violence around them, I am so pleased that our Representative Margaret Good is putting forth a new bill in our Florida legislature to greatly expand background checks for gun purchases in our state. This new legislation will make our kids and our communities safer!”- Sue Malony, Sandy Hook Promise “We know that requiring criminal background checks on all gun sales is the cornerstone of effective gun safety policy. And we’re not the only ones — twenty states and Washington, D.C., have enacted background checks laws because they are proven to save lives. We applaud Rep. Margaret Good for introducing legislation to close the background check loophole and working to improve public safety in Florida.”- Everytown for Gun Safety 

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