Criminal Background Checks Quotes

We have to enforce the laws we've already got, make sure that we're keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, those who are mentally ill. I also share your belief that weapons that were designed for soldiers in war theaters don't belong on our streets. And so what I'm trying to do is to get a broader conversation about how do we reduce the violence generally.

Today it is perfectly legal to discriminate against criminals in nearly all the ways that it was once legal to discriminate against African Americans. Once you're labeled a felon, the old forms of discrimination - employment discrimination, housing discrimination, denial of the right to vote, denial of educational opportunity, denial of food stamps and other public benefits, and exclusion from jury service - are suddenly legal.

If someone can produce the law that keeps guns out of the hands of criminals but protects the right of law-abiding citizens to possess them, and doesn't infringe on those rights, I would consider that. But all the proposals I've seen do not achieve that goal. And we are missing a golden opportunity to have an important debate about violence in the USA. Violence in our society is the problem.

The bottom line is if the president [Barack Obama] really wants to keep guns out of the hands of criminals, maybe his Justice Department should stop releasing felons, many of which are illegal immigrants, only to the streets of America.

If a law could keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of dangerous people, there would be virtually no gun crime at all.

When it comes to the issue of background checks, let's be honest - background checks will never be 'universal' - because criminals will never submit to them.

When I opened my first brew-pub, I did not include a checkbox on hiring applications that required applicants to disclose criminal convictions. And we were better for it.

We must always remember that the police are recruited from the criminal classes.