U.S. Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., said Friday that while he wants to keep guns out of the hands of terrorists, he also wants to make sure the freedoms and rights of Americans are protected and the goal is for both political parties to work together "to find the middle ground."
Boozman stopped by the offices of The Sentinel-Record Friday afternoon before speaking at the reception later that night to celebrate the Mid-America Science Museum's 2016 National Medal for Museum and Library Service.
Former U.S. attorney and Democratic candidate for Senate Connor Eldridge issued a statement Thursday condemning what he called Boozman's "refusal to act on even the most reasonable gun safety legislation" and claiming "Boozman thinks that suspected terrorists should be able to buy weapons."
Boozman said, "What you want to do is make it where we keep the public safe, but we don't give up our freedoms and that's the fine line. No one wants a situation where known terrorists have guns, but on the other hand we don't want it to where some people who might get caught up on some list don't have due process."
He said Congress was working hard "to come up with a good bill, hopefully a bipartisan bill, working together, Democrats and Republicans, trying to find common ground to come up with a good solution." He added, "This is certainly not something you want to politicize, as some are trying to do. That's not a good situation."
He said there were a couple of different terrorist lists, which causes confusion, and the main terrorist watch list "probably has more than a million people on it." He gave the example of someone walking by and seeing someone looking at an ISIS website and calling the FBI.
"That would probably get you on the list. There's no due process. You don't want to be in a situation where you start giving up freedoms without someone adjudicating at some point whether or not you should be on the list.
"People don't even know they're on the list. There's no way to defend yourself. You want to make sure your rights aren't arbitrarily taken away."
He said he recently had a classified briefing with the head of the FBI and they were trying to gather information from the top anti-terrorist officials and top law enforcement officials to craft a bill "to keep guns out of the hands of terrorists while not giving up individual liberties."
He stressed, "If we err, I believe strongly we should err on the side of freedom."
Boozman said he doesn't support banning all Muslims, as Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has suggested, but he does support a moratorium on Muslims, an idea he and U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., "came up with" to "make sure people coming in these situations are properly vetted."
He said there was a "real concern about that" and the challenge is that many of the people don't have records. "The administration says it is checking their records but the FBI will tell you there aren't any records. The reality is there's nothing in those records. If we're not sure if they pose a risk or not, we don't need to bring them in. Period.
"The number one duty of the federal government is keeping us safe. National security."
Asked about the mass shooting at an Orlando, Fla., night club by a suspected terrorist and what government could do to prevent future incidents, Boozman said, "What we need to do is get aggressive with ISIS. Wipe out the people spreading the hate that caused this guy to become radicalized."
He said one thing "we should have learned from Vietnam is you don't micromanage wars from Congress. You rely on the people on the ground to give good advice" and then give the defense department the "resources they need to prosecute the war."
To that end, Boozman said he supported the recent passage of the $602 billion military spending bill despite the threat of a veto by President Obama, who wants Guantanamo Bay to be closed.
"I am very much in favor of keeping Guantanamo open. I don't want those prisoners on American soil. (Obama) has made an effort to release people and sadly, we know some of those have already gone back to their old terrorist ways.
"We need to keep the people there and keep them away from the mainland. The people at Guantanamo now are the worst of the worst. The people who have killed or participated in acts of terror. The last thing we need to do is bring them to American soil."
Boozman said the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations has been doing "very important" work to get 12 separate spending bills passed. "We broke them down to make them manageable," he said, noting they got four or five passed already. "We got them passed out of committee and will get them on the House floor this week."
He said the importance of separating them is "so you are not stuck with a trillion dollar spending bill and no one knows exactly what's in there. It hasn't been able to be amended."
With separate bills, "If I have an idea we should not spend as much in one area, I can offer that. We vote on it. The House is doing the same thing. Eventually, we have a conference committee and go from there."
Asked about the national medal Mid-America Science Museum received, Boozman said, "It is such a great honor. I am so proud of the museum and the tremendous job they are doing. To be singled out like that shows what a great job the leadership is doing there."
He said the museum has become a destination visitors really enjoy and noted, "These things don't just happen. It takes a lot of hard work and I'm very proud of what they've done."
Local on 06/18/2016