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View Full Version : Virgin Islands governor's gun-confiscation plan probed by Republicans




Swordsmyth
07-20-2018, 12:01 AM
Republican lawmakers are inquiring into an order from U.S. Virgin Islands Gov. Kenneth Mapp that theoretically allowed the state to seize citizens’ firearms ahead of Hurricane Irma last year.
Rep. Rob Bishop, who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee, and Rep. Bob Goodlatte, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, sent Mapp, an independent, a letter Wednesday asking for clarification on an executive order (http://dailycaller.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/NATL-GUARD.pdf) he signed in September 2017 they said is still in effect.
The order, according to the two Republicans, gave the adjutant general the authority “to seize arms, ammunition, explosives and incendiary material and other property required.”
The order also “allows for the National Guard to spend government resources to acquire firearms and ammunition outside of normal government procurement processes.”
Bishop told Fox News’ Tucker Carlson the lawmakers want to know if “as devastating as those two hurricanes were, if that ever justifies the denial of a civil liberty or the denial of a constitutional right.”
The U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI) is a group of islands in the Caribbean. The islands were devastated by back-to-back hurricanes – Irma (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/09/09/hurricane-irma-devastates-us-virgin-islands-but-their-sense-community-is-unwavering.html) and Maria (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/09/19/hurricane-maria-wont-faze-us-virgin-islands-residents-staying-to-help-others-in-its-aftermath.html) – in September 2017.
“Just because there is an emergency – and I’m not denying, I’ve been there, I know how devastating that hurricane was for the islands – that still does not justify what this appears to justify,” Bishop, from Utah, said.

More at: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/07/19/virgin-islands-governors-gun-confiscation-plan-probed-by-republicans.html