Ohioans for Gun Safety Moves to Get Background Checks on 2020 Ballot

 

Ohioans for Gun Safety announced Monday that it has filed a petition with the Attorney General’s Office to get a background-checks measure placed on the 2020 ballot.

If the process is successful, Ohioans will be voting on the group’s “Act to Close Loopholes in Background Checks on Gun Sales” during the 2020 election.

According to Ohioans for Gun Safety, the act requires “that sales and transfers of firearms in the State of Ohio be conducted by a federally licensed firearms dealer and that sales or transfer of firearms be conditioned on the person receiving the firearm being subjected to a background check pursuant to federal law.”

“Basically, if you’re buying a gun, there needs to be a federally licensed dealer involved and they need to run a background check,” Ohioans for Gun Safety said in a press release.

Once certified by the Ohio Ballot Board, the next step requires Ohioans for Gun Safety to collect signatures from Ohio voters in a number that is equal to three percent of “the total vote cast for the office of governor during the most recent gubernatorial election,” according to the Secretary of State’s Office. Additionally, the signatures need to be obtained from at least 44 of Ohio’s 88 counties. The Ohio General Assembly then has four months to act on the proposed law.

“Ohioans for Gun Safety has spent the last couple years talking to Ohioans and gun violence prevention organizations to craft a ballot initiative to close loopholes in our background check law and create a safer Ohio,” said a press release. “We have crafted that language, filed today with the Ohio Attorney General’s Office and now we are ready to collect signatures to put it on the ballot as soon as 2020 and no later than 2021.”

The act does include some exceptions for gun transfers between family members, antique transfers, temporary transfers for the specific purpose of hunting, and temporary transfers to a federally licensed gunsmith for repair. The full text of the proposal can be read here.

Chris Dorr, director of Ohio Gun Owners, responded to the news in a Facebook video Monday.

“It’s going to be a long, protracted assault on our Second Amendment freedoms,” he said. “It’s going to require the undivided, long, and sustained attention of thousands upon thousands of gun owners for the next long while if we are going to be successful at defeating it.”

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Anthony Gockowski is managing editor of Battleground State News, The Ohio Star, and The Minnesota Sun. Follow Anthony on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Gun Shop” by U.S. Air Force photo by Kemberly Groue.