Fond du Lac Republican state representative Jeremy Thiesfeldt says he is opposed to universal gun background checks. Wisconsin governor Tony Evers and Democratic lawmakers are proposing an expansion of background checks for gun sales in the state. Representative Thiesfeldt says universal background checks would not accomplish anything. “It is a pathway toward a much larger restriction of second amendment rights in the United States of America,” Thiesfeldt told WFDL news. Thiesfeldt says you can’t do universal background checks without having a national gun registry. Thiesfeldt says lawmakers should pass something that’s actually going to work and is going to be constitutional. “There is grave concern on people’s part that the government knows who has the guns. That gives the government a whole lot of freedom to do whatever it is that they want to do to enforce laws, to take actions against its citizens, that are unconstitutional, and that is a legitimate concern,” Thiesfeldt told WFDL news. Thiesfeldt acknowledges that part of the reason for the gun violence is the freedom we have in the second amendment, tied to a decline in morality in this country. “With freedom comes more risk. We’re not a police state. What we need to have is a stronger morality in the people of this country. As we have seen morality decline in the United States, that’s when we’ve seen these mass shootings pick up.” Thiesfeldt says while the number of mass shootings is a concern it is still less than one percent of the total number of deaths per firearms in the country. “The costs that you saw in those two recent shootings, (Ohio and Texas) that happens in about a weekend in the city of Chicago and its by a whole lot more shooters,” Thiesfeldt said. “I would contend we have a whole lot bigger problem in places like Chicago which has some of the strongest gun control laws in the country.”
