How discouraging. A knee jerk reaction to a problem that has nothing to do with access to guns. If guns weren't available, knives, poison, acid, bricks, metal pipes, fists, feet, etc will be used. The problem as Daniel Green pointed out is not the tool

Most mentally ill are a danger only to themselves. Who will define eligibility to be 'red flagged' and how will 'red flagging' be enforced. Who would maintain a national data base and how secure would it be ? How would erroneous additions to the data base be corrected.

IMHO this is a dangerous step toward national gun confiscation.


Bipartisan ‘red flag’ gun laws plan has support in Congress
By MATTHEW DALYAugust 7, 2019

WASHINGTON (AP) — Despite frequent mass shootings, Congress has proved to be unable to pass substantial gun violence legislation, largely because of resistance from Republicans.

But a bipartisan proposal by Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., is gaining momentum following weekend mass shootings in Texas and Ohio that left 31 people dead. The emerging plan would create a federal grant program to encourage states to adopt “red flag” laws to take guns away from people believed to be dangers to themselves or others.

A similar bill never came up for a vote in the GOP-controlled Senate last year, but both parties express hope that this year will be different. President Donald Trump has signaled support for the plan.

“We must make sure that those judged to pose a grave risk to public safety do not have access to firearms and that if they do those firearms can be taken through rapid due process,” Trump said in a White House speech on Monday.

Many mass shootings “involved individuals who showed signs of violent behavior that are either ignored or not followed up on,” said Graham, chairman of the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee. “State red flag laws will provide the tools for law enforcement to do something about many of these situations before it’s too late.”

In an interview Tuesday, Blumenthal said there’s “a growing wave of support on both sides of the aisle” for the red-flag plan — more momentum in fact “than any other gun violence plan” being debated in Congress, including a proposal Blumenthal supports to require universal background checks for gun purchases.

A closer look at red flag laws, which have been adopted by at least 17 states and the District of Columbia, including a law set to take effect Aug. 24 in New York. Most of the laws have been approved since the February 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

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HOW DOES A RED FLAG LAW WORK?

In general, red flag or “extreme risk protection order” laws allow courts to issue temporary orders barring someone from possessing guns based on some showing of imminent danger or a risk of misuse.

State laws vary, but most stipulate that only specific people — usually family or household members — may petition a court for an extreme risk protection order. In some cases, a preliminary order may be granted without prior notice to the person who is the subject of the order.

Such an order typically is brief, ranging from a few days to about three weeks. Once the person who is alleged to pose a risk of gun violence has been given an opportunity to respond, a more permanent order may be granted, typically for up to a year.

Importantly to Graham and other supporters, before an order can be entered, some factual showing must be made that the subject of the order poses a risk of using a firearm to harm themselves or others.

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https://apnews.com/bdb661de1fe14e58951102349d5d44be

How the VA 'red-flags' patriots
Michelle Malkin: Gun-grabbing crisis vultures want to do to us all what they do to vets
Published: 3 days ago

Gun-grabbing crisis vultures just can’t let the latest mass shootings go to waste. “Red flag” laws are now all the rage in the Beltway as the magic pill to prevent homicidal maniacs from wreaking havoc on the nation. Even President Donald Trump has endorsed the idea of preemptively confiscating people’s firearms if they are deemed a “threat.”

But if you want to know how this American version of China’s social credit system would work in practice, let me remind you of how Veterans Affairs recklessly red-flags “disruptive” citizens without due process, transparency or accountability in the name of “safety.” Government bureaucrats routinely deprive our nation’s heroes of medical treatment based on arbitrary definitions of who and what constitutes a mental health menace.

I first reported on the VA’s secretive database on “disgruntled” and “disruptive” vets five years ago. Under the VA policy on “patient record flags,” federal bureaucrats can classify vets as “threats” based on assessments of their “difficult,” “annoying” and “noncompliant” behavior. The VA manual says the flags “are used to alert Veterans Health Administration medical staff and employees of patients whose behavior and characteristics may pose a threat either to their safety, the safety of other patients, or compromise the delivery of quality health care.”

What a crock. It’s precisely because so many vets receive inferior care from the feds that they have been forced to raise their voices. Have we all forgotten the 40 veterans who perished at the Phoenix, Arizona VA, which relegated patients to a bureaucratic black hole through secret waiting lists? Among examples of patients’ behavior referred to the red-flaggers in the VA’s “Disruptive Behavior Committees” (Orwell couldn’t have cooked up a better name): venting “frustration about VA services and/or wait times, threatening lawsuits or to have people fired, and frequent unwarranted visits to the emergency department or telephone calls to facility staff.”

Disabled Air Force veteran and veterans advocate/attorney Benjamin Krause has exposed the Soviet-style targeting of veterans flagged for exercising their First Amendment rights or threatening to sue the VA over neglectful care or for simply being too “expensive.” He calls it “straight out of a totalitarian regime.” In 2013, the VA inspector general concluded that the bureaucracy “does not have a comprehensive definition of what constitutes disruptive behavior.” In January 2018, a VA Office of Inspector General report found that large numbers of flagged veterans were being left in the dark about being placed on dangerous patient lists – with no recourse to remove phony flags or appeal in any meaningful way.

Despite rules requiring the “Disruptive Behavior Committee” to notify flagged patients of their status and informing them of their right to amend their reports, the OIG found no evidence in 49 percent of electronic health records that the panels had provided such notice and disclosure.

In 25 percent of medical records reviewed, the OIG “found no evidence that patients were informed they had the right to request to amend or appeal” special orders restricting care of flagged patients.

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https://www.wnd.com/2019/08/how-the-va-red-flags-patriots/