Just great. It’s like we either lost the last Civil War, or have already lost the next one.
In a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt said he had been told that FBI agents planned to visit several county sheriffs departments in August to audit concealed carry weapons permits. In a news release about the letter, Schmitt’s office painted the planned audits as “Illegal Attempts to Harvest Concealed Carry Permit Information from Missouri Sheriffs.” The release said the office became aware that the FBI was planning to travel to Missouri to audit sheriff departments across the state.
Schmitt, a MAGA, Trump worshipping Republican who is running for U.S. Senate in the upcoming August primary, wrote a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Wednesday criticizing the agency for overstepping its authority and violating Missouri law. He called on the agency to cease the planned audits.
“This is not going to happen,” Schmitt wrote in the letter. “I will fight you tooth and nail with all of the resources that the people of Missouri have given me as their Attorney General.”
Schmitt also contended allowing federal agents to access the permit records would violate the Second Amendment.
And that impacts a “well regulated militia” how, exactly?
In 2013, the Legislature passed a law that included a provision transferring responsibility for issuing identification cards for concealed gun permits from driver’s license clerks to local sheriffs after revelations that state agencies provided permit records to federal employees investigating fraud.
U.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) also sent a letter to Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray, asking why he is directing FBI agents to conduct ‘audits’ of Missouri county sheriffs’ records of concealed carry weapons permit holders.
FBI representatives in Kansas City, St. Louis and Washington D.C. did not immediately respond to requests for comment.