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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Cornyn's Republican Proposal (backed by NRA): Under Republican legislation, the federal government may delay the sale of a firearm to someone on the watch list for up to 72 hours. During that time, if the government can show a judge there's "probable cause" that the individual is plotting terrorism, then the gun sale is denied outright.  But if the government cannot show that the individual is plotting terrorism within 72 hours, the individual gets the gun.

Dem Proposal: The Democratic bill allows the federal government to block anyone on the government's watch list from buying a gun. The gun buyer can challenge the block in court.  The government's decision will be sustained only if a "preponderance of evidence" [i.e., more likely than not] indicates that the attorney general has a "reasonable belief" that the prospective gun buyer may be engaged in terrorism.

[/quote]

First PP who asked the question here, and this is very helpful.  Thanks.  The Politico article was worse than unhelpful in explaining this.

It seems like there should be some compromise possible here.  The obvious one would be to put a cap on the amount of time the DOJ has to come up with its "preponderance of evidence" in a court challenge.  You could imagine ultimately creating a "no buy" list that requires a much higher standard of evidence to get on, but being on that list means it's easy for DOJ to prove you shouldn't get a gun.  There could be a secondary "watch list" that's a bit more gray, and the restrictions would accordingly be more lax.

FWIW, it seems to me that Mateen would probably end up on the gray list, but this type of legislation is still valuable.[/quote]

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