By Revathi Satish
Abstract
For decades now, successive US Presidents have tried to solve the southern border immigration crisis and have failed repeatedly. While they may be tackling the consequences of the problem, they are not analysing the grassroots question – why are so many immigrants landing up at the southern border? This article answers this question by analysing the role of American weapons in fuelling one of the biggest immigration crises in the world.
When shocking massacres took place at Port Arthur in Queensland, Australia (1996) and in a Mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand (2019), Australian Prime Minister John Howard and New Zealand Premier Jacinda Arden, backed by their respective governments, instantaneously set the ball rolling towards reforming the country’s gun laws. They were driven by the righteous belief that indifference to acts of violence endangers tomorrow’s generation. However, the same cannot be said for the United States. Even after numerous gruesome incidents of gun violence over the decades, more than 50 mass shootings since 1999 and thousands of innocent lives lost (20,138 deaths in 2022 alone), America’s efforts towards gun reform continue to chip away as the memories of these tragic incidents get fainter only to be torn open again with a fresh list of individuals whose lives could have been saved, had Washington been more responsive to the first one.
America’s relaxed gun laws might just be the main source of fuel to another crisis that most administrations have struggled with and tried to control, but none have successfully found a solution to – the immigration crisis at the Southern border. The leniency of the gun laws in the US is interlinked with the border crisis in a deep-rooted and vicious circle at the middle of which lies the champion of gun ownership – the National Rifle Association.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) is an American gun ownership advocacy group founded in 1871. It has played a key role in influencing US gun policy, exporting gun culture, and contributing to gun violence for the last 50 years. Over the years, the NRA has built its agenda around two main pillars: One, to advocate for gun rights by arguing that more guns make the country safer. This narrative is based on a misinterpreted and inaccurate elucidation of the Second Amendment (which gives people the right to bear arms); The NRA has acted to kill universal background checks and stop funding and support for government initiatives to track the movement of firearms. Two, to thwart any effort towards achieving any form of gun reform in the United States. It has been successful in this aspect due to the enormous power and influence it holds over Capitol Hill.
For years, the NRA’s budget and political membership have allowed it to influence Congress on gun policy. With an annual lobbying amount of 4.4 million dollars in 2022, the NRA has managed to influence primaries and ensure that pro-gun candidates get elected. The election of Donald Trump in 2016, was a huge victory for them. Since then, Donald Trump has advanced the association’s staunched manifesto by pulling the United States out of the 2014 Arms Trade Treaty, which the NRA has been opposing for years. The Treaty sought to supervise the movement of arms and ammunition exports to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands, thus avoiding war crimes and human rights abuse. The US Government launched the Arms Transfer Initiative in 2017 to ease restrictions on the sale of arms overseas and practically make data regarding transactions virtually impossible to acquire. In 2020, the NRA spent 12 million dollars to campaign against Joe Biden. Some of the NRA’s biggest political beneficiaries are: Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who received $442,333 dollars from the NRA to prevent any sort of gun reform in the state, despite the Uvalde School Shooting that saw 19 children and 2 teachers killed; Florida Senator Marco Rubio, a staunch pro-gun politician, has received more than 3.3 million in donations; Mitch McConnell, Senate Minority Leader received more than 1.2 million over his career.
As a result of the NRA’s intense lobbying, passing gun reform in the Senate or Congress is now an impossible task. After the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting, President Barack Obama proposed a bill to mandate background checks and an assault weapons ban. However, Republicans dragged the talks for many months ultimately failing to reach a deal. In the 2015 Charleston Shooting and the San Bernardino shooting, Democrats put forth a bill to extend criminal background checks and prohibit individuals on terrorist watchlists from buying guns. This bill was killed by Republicans in the Senate in a 50 – 48 vote. The film replayed itself in the 2018 Parkland shooting, the 2019 El Paso shooting, and recently the Uvalde Texas shooting in 2022. The victims differ, but Washington’s response and the NRA’s modus operandi remain the same: 1) Fund pro-gun candidates. 2) Buy politicians with NRA money. 3) Ensure no gun reform is passed.
Due to virtually no background checks or arms sales tracking, guns are smuggled by cartels like the American-Salvadoran MS-13 and 18th Street Gang or bought by licensed owners who sell it to third parties (known as ‘straw purchasing’, one of the main ways criminals acquire arms) that use it for illegitimate and unethical purposes such as homicides, gang violence and massacres. Most of the weapons found in Central America, specifically in the Northern Triangle where 29% of guns in Guatemala, 46% in El Salvador and 49% in Honduras, can be traced back to the United States. In 2022, more than 200,000 firearms in Mexico came from the US. On several occasions, Mexico has also blamed the United States for not doing enough to prevent more than 10 million firearms over the last decade, from being brought illegally into Mexico, which has led to more than 30,000 killings. These gangs and drug cartels use illegally obtained firearms to conduct raids, violence, shootings and other crimes like homicide etc., in poor, resource-deficient countries like Guatemala, Honduras and Venezuela. This causes people from these countries to flee their homes and travel north to the US southern border in hopes of obtaining asylum.
The cumulative effect of inefficient gun laws influenced by the NRA that profoundly advocates concealment of data regarding where the weapons are going and who they are sold to, paired with the smuggling of arms across Central America has manifested in the massive immigration crisis that plagues the Southern border. To make matters worse, one of the NRA’s main talking points over the years has revolved around selling the idea of an ‘immigrant invasion’ to native citizens. That has led them to believe that guns are a prerequisite to protect themselves from the potentially dangerous motives of immigrants who are granted asylum in the United States. This results in a vicious circle that is fueled by weapon enthusiasts who are using American citizens’ insecurities against them as a method of hiding their dirty laundry.
CONCLUSION:
In conclusion, if the United States wants to resolve its border crisis permanently, it must start not at the border, but in Washington. Achieving gun control has become not just a disquieting crisis, but a necessity and an imperative precondition to solving related issues, not the least of which being, recognizing the NRA for what it is doing. The NRA is advocating for loose gun laws that help weapons flow into Central America, which then contribute to the violence that causes people to flee their countries in hopes of obtaining asylum in the US. The NRA then uses the excuse of violence by immigrants to sell and export more guns. This vicious cycle will continue to go on unless the people with the real dangerous motives are caught. And they are not the ones coming through the border, they are sitting at the Capitol.
Author’s Bio
Revathi Satish is a 1st Year BA.LLB student at Jindal Global Law School.
Image Source: https://www.firstpost.com/world/joe-biden-ban-assault-weapons-1994-12044102.html
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