Clinging to an issue she endorsed while serving in the embattled administration of Bill Clinton for eight years, former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno says she still believes all gun owners should be licensed in order to “curb crime.”
Reno, a former Miami-Dade judge, stopped short of calling for firearms registration, the Tampa Tribune newspaper reported last week.
But she did say in remarks to members of the Capital Tiger Bay Club that gun owners should be compelled to demonstrate that “they know how to safely and lawfully” use their guns.
“My approach to guns is anybody who possesses a weapon ought to demonstrate they know how to safely and lawfully use them, and if they don’t do so, take them back,” she said, also attacking what she called America’s reputation as the most violent industrialized nation in the world.
Licensing gun owners would go far towards curbing that violence and getting rid of the “most violent nation” rap, she said.
She also emphasized that her approach is different from firearms registration in what seemed like a play on words. According to the Tampa paper, Reno described the effort instead as licensing firearm owners “for each gun” they own.
Marion Hammer, the chief lobbyist in Tallahassee for the National Rifle Association, said Reno’s remarks aren’t surprising, the paper said.
“That flies in the face of freedom,” Hammer told the paper. “She has a history of disrespecting the Second Amendment.”
Reno, a Democrat, has also expressed an interest in running against Gov. Jeb Bush, brother to President Bush, for the state’s top job in 2002. She said she plans to announce by Labor Day or mid-September whether she will seek the party’s nomination.
Other Democrats either seeking their party’s nomination or contemplating a run include U.S. Rep. Jim Davis of Tampa, former Ambassador to Vietnam Pete Peterson, Tampa lawyer Bill McBride, state House Minority Leader Lois Frankel, state Sen. Daryl Jones and Tallahassee Mayor Scott Maddox, the Miami Herald said.
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