Description:
As ordered reported by the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs
on September 12, 2012
S. 1707 would modify an existing requirement that certain individuals determined to be mentally incompetent by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) be prohibited from purchasing or possessing legal firearms. CBO expects that implementing S. 1707 would have no significant budgetary impact.
When VA deems individuals to be mentally incapacitated, mentally incompetent, experiencing an extended loss of consciousness, or otherwise unable to manage their own affairs, it is required to provide that information to the Department of Justice (DOJ). Such individuals are then added to the list of those prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms. Under S. 1707, veterans would have to be determined by judicial authority to be dangerous before VA would be required to report them to DOJ, thus slightly reducing the administrative burden on VA.
Enacting S. 1707 would not affect direct spending or revenues; therefore, pay-as-you-go procedures do not apply.
S. 1707 contains no intergovernmental or private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act and would not affect the budgets of state, local, or tribal governments.
