All eight Tennessee Republican U.S. Representatives signed onto a letter sent to the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), an agency of the Department of Commerce, demanding its recent 90-day pause on civilian firearm exports be lifted immediately.
On October 27, the Department of Commerce announced the pause on commercial firearm exports, writing in a press release, “Effective immediately, the U.S. Department of Commerce (the Department) is pausing for approximately 90 days the issuance of new export licenses involving certain firearms, related components, and ammunition under its jurisdiction and the provision of new export assistance activities for such products to all non-governmental end users worldwide, apart from those in certain destinations.”
In the Tuesday letter, the lawmakers wrote, “As long as evil persists, there will always be a need for good people to defend themselves and their loved ones. The need for the Second Amendment was not limited to the American Revolution nor the American Republic. Every person has a right to self-defense. Not only does BIS’s pause on firearms export licenses leave people even more vulnerable, but it will also push buyers to look elsewhere to meet their customers’ demands.”
The lawmakers added, “Belligerent actors are becoming more aggressive and emboldened; regimes like Iran and China are posturing toward force and increasing their military capabilities. The surprise attacks against Israel should dispel any notion that BIS can justly or accurately assess who needs firearms for defense and who does not.”
The lawmakers said by demanding the Department of Commerce end “this ridiculous hypocrisy and continue the issuance of export licenses for firearms, related components, and ammunition.”
“Continuing this pause will only weaken law-abiding civilians and hand criminal actors a monopoly of force. We also urge that BIS’s final assessment not deprive innocent people of the means for self-defense,” the lawmakers added.
The letter was sent by a total of 88 lawmakers, including Tennessee representatives Diana Harshbarger (R-TN-01), Tim Burchett (R-TN-02), Chuck Fleischmann (R-TN-03), Scott DesJarlais (R-TN-04), Andy Ogles (R-TN-05), John Rose (R-TN-06), Mark Green (R-TN-07), and David Kustoff (R-TN-08)
The letter has also been endorsed by The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), Gun Owners of America (GOA), National Rifle Association (NRA), American Suppressors Association (ASA), the Firearms & Ammunition Import/Export Roundtable, and Heritage Action.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
Photo “Gun Store” by Thayne Tuason. CC BY-SA 4.0.
