Gun Owners of America may soon join fellow conservatives in opposing comprehensive immigration reform, warning that a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants would lead to an increase in “anti-gun voters.”
Not only does the group oppose comprehensive legislation for clear partisan reasons, GOA spokesman Mike Hammond told the American Family Association’s news service the group may also work to defeat such bills if they include biometric identification or background checks for jobs.
Pro-gun group branching out
Meanwhile, a pro-gun organization is strongly considering getting into the immigration enforcement battle, believing that amnesty for illegal immigrants would likely mean millions more “anti-gun voters.”
Gun advocacy groups are breathing a collective sigh of relief after last week the Senate rejected several key measures that would have trampled on Second Amendment rights. Mike Hammond, legislative counsel for Gun Owners of America, tells American Family News his organization might jump into the immigration debate.
“This is a debate in which presumably we’re going to have about seven million new anti-gun voters put on the rolls,” he explains. “It is an issue which fundamentally is going to affect whether gun control is inevitable 15 years from now.”
According to Hammond, GOA dislikes even the supposed “good” parts of the immigration reform package.
“We don’t like the notion that every American would have to get a biometric ID card. We don’t like the fact that every American would have to get a Brady check for jobs before he could get employed in America,” he states.
“So we not only don’t like the bad things about the immigration bill, we don’t like the good things about the immigration bill,” Hammond summarizes.
GOA has already put out an alert saying it is uncomfortable with amnesty.
