Someone in the GOP just doesn't get it... CHP info request

I hope this decision was made by some intern somewhere... the GOP sure isn't doing themselves any favors here.

Virginia GOP asks for concealed gun permit holders personal information

TFred

TFred said:

I hope this decision was made by some intern somewhere... the GOP sure isn't doing themselves any favors here.

Virginia GOP asks for concealed gun permit holders personal information

TFred

Click to expand...

VCOG:

The Republican Party Chair is asking for a list of permit holders.[SUP]1[/SUP]
A clerk of court is refusing, in part because the bill was passed.[SUP]2

[/SUP]

TFred said:

I hope this decision was made by some intern somewhere... the GOP sure isn't doing themselves any favors here.

Virginia GOP asks for concealed gun permit holders personal information

TFred

Click to expand...

You called this one right after the law passed TFred. A scramble before July 1.
Now think of this. VCDL likes to brag on te number of CHP holders in Va. The truth is, most people that want one have one....so the existing list is pretty accurate.

Within a year, new ways to find a list will be found and the process starts over again.


VCOG:

The Republican Party Chair is asking for a list of permit holders.[SUP]1[/SUP]
A clerk of court is refusing, in part because the bill was passed.[SUP]2

[/SUP]

Thank you, Richard L Francis, for standing up for us all.

That's one. Now is VCDL going to pressure every other court to respond in the same way? I mean it is about permits, after all.

MSG Laigaie said:

Thank you, Richard L Francis, for standing up for us all.

Click to expand...

Well......
I happen to personally agree even though I don't have a dog in this fight.
My objective opinion is different though.

Reason's 1 and 2 are good. You'd think the GOP would know The Circuit Court Records are governed by the Supreme Court rules and not subject to FOIA (same for GD Court).

Reason number 3 concerns me some. Dealing with idiots like the Petersburg and Hanover Circuit Court Clerks is a nightmare because they throw the law to In-ter-pa-tation..theirs, with no real basis in law. Why is this decision better just because it agrees with our view?

Just stating reasons 1 and 2 would have been sufficient and better IMO>

peter nap said:

You called this one right after the law passed TFred. A scramble before July 1.
Now think of this. VCDL likes to brag on te number of CHP holders in Va. The truth is, most people that want one have one....so the existing list is pretty accurate.

Click to expand...

I may have gotten the "what" right, but boy did I blow the "who!"

I figured it would be the newspapers and TV stations and all the OTHER gun-haters and those who want to have "something to hold over" the law abiding gun owners of Virginia.

Never figured it would be those who love to proclaim their "support" so loudly as the Republicans.

Very disappointing.

TFred

Ha ha, I just read the letter from the clerk... I can't help but wonder what motivated him to include a very close copy of a hilarious line from Pirates of the Caribbean!


TFred

From the code the clerk referenced:


Is the purpose of this to prevent someone from using FOIA to get the clerk's office to do their legal research for them? Title searches, etc?

TFred

The GOP has withdrawn their requests for names.

Request withdrawn

Amazing what a little light can do.

I suppose I can believe the story, "just trying to add to the support lists..." but along with that version comes an AWFUL lot of baggage in the form of totally not understanding the demographic of the CHP holder. I'm not sure which is more costly in terms of political capital. Might have been cheaper just to throw an intern under the bus.

Republican Party of Virginia withdraws request for handgun permit records

TFred

TFred said:

Amazing what a little light can do.

I suppose I can believe the story, "just trying to add to the support lists..." but along with that version comes an AWFUL lot of baggage in the form of totally not understanding the demographic of the CHP holder. I'm not sure which is more costly in terms of political capital. Might have been cheaper just to throw an intern under the bus.

Republican Party of Virginia withdraws request for handgun permit records

TFred

Click to expand...

Have you ever noticed how the GOP always manages to shoot themselves in the foot with an unloaded gun?

That initial request may cost the Republicans dearly come November.

So they can launch a full court press for donations and support at a target audience.

TFred said:

From the code the clerk referenced:

A. The provisions of this chapter shall not apply to:

[...]

5. The records required by law to be maintained by the clerks of the courts of record, as defined in § 1-212, and courts not of record, as defined in § 16.1-69.5. However, other records maintained by the clerks of such courts shall be public records and subject to the provisions of this chapter.​

Is the purpose of this to prevent someone from using FOIA to get the clerk's office to do their legal research for them? Title searches, etc?

TFred

Click to expand...

I've always viewed it as a really good excuse to not have to release records -- they can only release records that currently exist and are readily available (along with other limitations and stipulations) and so a "list of" [e.g., names of whatever] are seldom going to be already in existence (unless otherwise mandated by law, such as registered voters). So as there is no master list of CHP holders, given that each permit is an individual docket entry, they don't maintain a master list and don't then have to create one. It is a way to prevent someone from using FOIA to get the clerk's office to do their legal research, or another way to look at it is that it is a way to prevent abuses caused by a never ending pile of FOIA submissions which could be used to "task" a government agency.

Don't get me wrong -- I am personally happy that in this instance the "excuse" was used to effectively shut this down, but in other situations I've been on the other end of things knowing that this excuse is being used to essentially keep information from being available.

There is as far as I know nothing which prevents someone (as of today) from going to the clerks office and themselves looking at records (and perhaps taking notes).

It's also interesting that so many clerks are making the claim that lists do not exist when until as late as 18 or so months ago, I know for a fact that one local newspaper was still publishing just that, a "list" of all the recently granted CHPs for our area. And I know for a fact that for many years, as recently as about 3 or 4 years ago, the largest local newspaper published these same monthly lists from several jurisdictions in the area of all the new CHP holders. It was these lists that finally (along with the New York scandal) pushed this bill through the General Assembly.)

At that point, the clerks or someone in their office WAS definitely providing these lists to the newspaper. They would send someone on a monthly road trip to each clerk's office to get the latest list.

Since that practice was discontinued, I know that the clerk in Fredericksburg has changed, and is now much more gun-friendly than the former clerk was, and in fact a discussion with one of his deputies a few weeks revealed that this office had the same line of thinking, that there WAS no list to provide.

I almost wonder if the clerks received some sort of guidance on this from higher up... It seems a little suspicious that so many would think of the same excuse independently, especially after so many years of providing those lists with no questions asked.

TFred

XD40sc said:

So they can launch a full court press for donations and support at a target audience.

Click to expand...

Maybe they'd get a little more mileage out of actually supporting the RKBA.

TFred said:

I almost wonder if the clerks received some sort of guidance on this from higher up... It seems a little suspicious that so many would think of the same excuse independently, especially after so many years of providing those lists with no questions asked.

TFred

Click to expand...

That, I think, is a very good observation. I have long thought that clerks were on their own perhaps assembling lists that weren't required. For example, a less than RKBA friendly clerk decides to sort out all the permit granting cases to create a list that is then "available" to provide to a newspaper. And if that's so I can easily imagine guidance being given about stopping that. That would possibly explain why things pretty much stopped in VA.

drdan01 said:

That, I think, is a very good observation. I have long thought that clerks were on their own perhaps assembling lists that weren't required. For example, a less than RKBA friendly clerk decides to sort out all the permit granting cases to create a list that is then "available" to provide to a newspaper. And if that's so I can easily imagine guidance being given about stopping that. That would possibly explain why things pretty much stopped in VA.

Click to expand...

I can't discount your theory, but I have a much different one of my own. After seeing several years of the privacy bill ALMOST make it out of the Senate sub-committees, and the loud raucous raised by the CHP-supporters when the Democratic Senate leadership had to resort to CHEATING to kill the bill in the sub-committee, it's my firm belief that the Virginia Press Association basically told their members to stop printing lists, at the peril of losing all access to the information altogether. That would also stop them from being able to throw down the anti-CHP flag every time some nut who happened to have a CHP ever committed a crime that made the newspaper. THAT, IMHO, was something they really didn't want to lose.

TFred

ETA: Ironically, even from an anti-gun point of view, it would seem to me that they should embrace CHPs, because it's an extra level of government oversight and background check. I always wanted to ask one of them (anti-gun press person) the brain stumper: "If John Doe has decided he IS going to buy a gun, would you rather he also obtain, or not obtain a CHP to go with it?" I suppose to an anti-gun person, that question is sort of like, "have you stopped beating your wife?"

TFred said:

I always wanted to ask one of them (anti-gun press person) the brain stumper: "If John Doe has decided he IS going to buy a gun, would you rather he also obtain, or not obtain a CHP to go with it?" I suppose to an anti-gun person, that question is sort of like, "have you stopped beating your wife?"

Click to expand...

So, are the politicos asking for a list of sex offenders? How about a list of DUIs? Or, maybe a list of DV offenders?

No. They are asking for lists of concealed carriers. I think maybe they want to investigate the danger of committing some kind of anti-social act and want to know where it's safe to do so.

Maverick9 said:

So, are the politicos asking for a list of sex offenders? How about a list of DUIs? Or, maybe a list of DV offenders?

No. They are asking for lists of concealed carriers. I think maybe they want to investigate the danger of committing some kind of anti-social act and want to know where it's safe to do so.

Click to expand...

What they had in mind Maverick, was targeting Chippers as a strong source of votes and donations. I'm afraid that idea backfired!