EXCLUSIVE — The U.S. government conditioned a plea agreement with a defendant stipulating they sign a secret form, which was not authorized through Congress and has been slammed as “unconstitutional” by Republican lawmakers, that stripped their rights to buy, own, or use firearms, documents show.
Between 2011 and 2019, the FBI, Secret Service, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement coordinated to obtain signatures on an internal form from at least 60 U.S. citizens that stripped their gun rights, according to newly obtained records and multiple Washington Examiner reports. In at least one instance, the bureau and Secret Service worked behind closed doors with what appears to be a government prosecutor who conditioned signing of the form as part of a legal case, the Washington Examiner has learned.
WATCHDOGS RAISE CONCERNS OVER FBI STRIPPING GUN RIGHTS FROM CITIZENS
“Dear Agent [redacted],” reads a June 10, 2019, letter written by a lawyer to a Secret Service agent in West Palm Beach, Florida. “You will find enclosed the NICS firearm form which has been signed by my client and his doctor. This is being provided in compliance with [redacted] plea agreement. Yours sincerely.”
It’s unclear what the 2019 defendant was being charged with or why the FBI and Secret Service had involvement. The FBI redacted the case number on the document, which was obtained by the firearms rights group Gun Owners of America through the Freedom of Information Act and shared with the Washington Examiner.
Secondly, it’s unclear why the government used the form, which registered people into the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System and asked signatories to identify as a “danger” to themselves or others or also lacking the “mental capacity adequately to contract” their lives. Second Amendment lawyers, including GOA’s outside counsel, Robert Olson, told the Washington Examiner that U.S. citizens can’t legally forfeit their gun rights.
The person who signed the plea agreement was evidently not barred from owning guns until voluntarily signing the FBI’s form and the government asked the defendant to agree to a punishment comparable with a different type of crime, said Olson. Lawyers have previously honed in on how the form did not go through public comment through the Office of Management and Budget, which is required before the government collects information from the public.
“There’s a bit of a contradiction,” Gilbert Ambler, a constitutional attorney who specializes in firearms law, told the Washington Examiner. “They’re having you agree you’re incompetent. If you’re incompetent, how is that a binding agreement?”
Ambler added, “It’s an example of something more nefarious, which is individuals within the government pursuing a goal of disarming people. That is not something supported by our legislature. In fact, it is contrary to what our legislature has done because there are set forth conditions on when somebody can be disarmed.”
Ambler specifically pointed to the Gun Control Act of 1968, noting there are “established conditions” for someone to lose their gun rights. The act holds that someone may be prohibited from owning firearms if he or she is “adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to a mental institution” but does not mention people being able to rule themselves unfit to possess guns.
“Any person who has been ‘adjudicated as a mental defective’ or ‘committed to a mental institution’ is prohibited under federal law from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing any firearm or ammunition,” according to a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives document on the Gun Control Act. “Violation of this federal offense is punishable by a fine of $250,000 and/or imprisonment of up to ten years.”
There’s no indication in documents that the defendant who signed the 2019 plea agreement was either ruled a “mental defective,” a legal term referring to those held to be suffering from insanity or incompetence, or put into a mental institution.
The latest revelation comes after the Washington Examiner reported earlier this month that the FBI coordinated secretly with hospitals and medical centers to strip at least five U.S. citizens of their gun rights.
Following that report, several watchdog groups raised concerns over the FBI’s actions in collaboration with private and public medical facilities.
“Frustratingly, every day, there seems to be a new revelation of the FBI working to violate the rights of American citizens,” Tom Jones, president of the American Accountability Foundation, a conservative watchdog, told the Washington Examiner, calling on the Republican-led Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government to launch an investigation.
House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), who also leads the weaponization subcommittee, has previously vowed to investigate the FBI over the gun forms.
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In October last year, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and more than a dozen lawmakers demanded the FBI and Justice Department provide evidence that the forms are not being used anymore. Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-GA) sponsored a resolution one month later, which requested Attorney General Merrick Garland turn over documents in relation to the forms and was rejected by Democrats.
The FBI and Secret Service did not reply to requests for comment.
