Fact Checker: No, 40% of firearms (still) aren’t purchased without a background check

Democracy Dies in Darkness
	The truth behind the rhetoric
	No, 40% of firearms (still) aren’t purchased without a background check

Tall tales and heated emotions run deep in on both sides of the gun debate. In the wake of the Valentine’s Day shooting at a Florida high school, claims that we thought had been buried long ago suddenly came back to life. For example, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) told viewers of “Meet the Press” last Sunday, “We have to end the absurdity of the gun show loophole. Forty percent of the guns in this country are sold without any background checks.” The Fact Checker debunked this statistic twice in 2013 and again in 2015. But it just won’t go away. So, we took another look.

This number comes from a two-decade old study that looked at all gun transactions, inclduing gifts and inheritances — not just gun sales like Sanders says. A recent national survey examined gun sales between 2015 and 2017. It found that 13 percent of people surveyed who purchased a firearm didn’t have a background check. As for anyone who obtained a firearm (through purchase, inheritance, gifts etc.), only 22 percent of participants didn’t have a background check.

So, Sanders used stale data to claim three times the number of gun purchases happened without a background check than is true. For resurrecting a claim that should have stayed buried, Sanders earns Four Pinocchios.

A guide to President Trump’s error-filled tweetstorm about the Russia investigation

It feels like it could have been a month ago, but it was just last weekend when President Trump complained about the Russia investigation in a tweetstorm that spanned from late Saturday night to early Sunday morning. Here’s a quick guide to his claims.

The president claimed he “never said Russia did not meddle in the election.” But there are numerous instances of Trump suggesting that the Russian intervention was a hoax ginned up by Democrats and denouncing the investigation into whether members of the Trump campaign had worked with the Russians, even after meetings and conversations were revealed.

He blamed the FBI for missing signs about the gunman in Florida, saying they were “spending too much time trying to prove Russian collusion with Trump campaign” But Trump seems to have missed that the FBI is a massive federal agency and there’s no evidence that there is any connection between agents in the Miami field office and the Russia investigation.

He went on to say the “only Collusion was between Russia and Crooked H, the DNC and the Dems” citing the Trump-Russia dossier, the Uranium One deal and Clinton campaign manager John Podesta’s company the Podesta group was involved with a Russian company. We have previously debunked these claims when Trump first tried to turn the tables on Clinton by claiming she colluded with the Russians.

In the end, Trump pivoted to the Obama administration, suggesting there was something nefarious, worthy of an investigation by Congress, the FBI or the Department of Justice, about a cash settlement of claims with Iran. Trump misses the mark. The fishy part of the deal is not that cash was involved – Iranian banks were cut off from the banking system – but the timing of it. The State Department announced the settlement the same day Iran released American detainees.

Bernie Sanders resurrects a ‘zombie’ claim on gun sales without background checks The senator from Vermont says 40 percent of guns are sold without a background check. That's an old, discredited figure that's been debunked before. By Glenn Kessler  •   Read more »    Trump’s claim that he’s been ‘much tougher on Russia than Obama’ The administration has taken some actions that displease Russia. But Trump's tone is jarringly different. By Glenn Kessler  •   Read more »

Are Senate Republicans killing ‘blue slip’ for court nominees? The Senate's “blue slip” for judicial nominees could be on its way out. But it's not all it's cracked up to be. By Salvador Rizzo  •   Read more »    Fact-checking Trump, NRA claims on gun background checks A national database that screens potential gun buyers has become a hot topic, but various claims about it miss the mark. By Salvador Rizzo  •   Read more »

Fact-checking Trump’s error-filled tweetstorm about the Russia investigation Here's a guide to the many errant claims made by the president during his tweetstorm about the Russia probe. By Glenn Kessler  •   Read more »