As part of President Trump’s crackdown on crime in the District of Columbia, his administration has significantly sped up the process for getting a gun permit.
According to Fox News, the permit process and gun registration process “have been slashed from months down to days via Trump’s Making DC Safe and Beautiful Task Force.”
The effort was hailed by the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA), which said in a statement to the media, “No law-abiding citizen should have to wait months before he or she can register their firearms, or obtain a concealed carry permit.”
CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb observed, “Purposeful foot-dragging by anti-gun-rights bureaucrats is absurd, and it has been known to cost lives.
“We know how historically hostile the District government has been toward the Second Amendment,” he continued, “and we are delighted the president’s task force has apparently turned this around. Any effort to combat violent crime must include making it possible for honest citizens to fight back. This has not been possible under previous administrations, which discouraged people from exercising their fundamental rights. Under the Trump administration, that is changing, and we encourage the District government to get in the game.”
Under the task force’s efforts, according to Fox News, local residents are now able to book next-day appointments to register their firearms with the Metropolitan Police Department. Walk-in appointments are now available and advertised on the police department’s website.
Previously, applicants typically waited four months for a firearms registration appointment, Fox Digital reported.
“Nowhere in the United States,” CCRKBA’s Gottlieb stated, “and especially in the nation’s capital—where the heart and soul of government resides—should law-abiding citizens be faced with deliberately-sluggish regulations and snail’s pace schedules which prevent them from exercising all of their rights, including those protected by the Second Amendment.”
The District began issuing permits after the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its landmark 2008 ruling in the Heller case, which struck down the District’s handgun ban. Yet, the city has made it extremely difficult for average citizens to get a permit ever since.+
“The time has come for violent criminals to realize the District of Columbia is no longer their sanctuary,” Gottlieb stated. “CCRKBA has always stood up for the rights of our fellow citizens to keep and bear arms, no matter where they live. We’re gratified to see an administration which shares that perspective.”
