To ensure secure gun storage and gun safety devices.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 3626, which will extend by 10 years the authorization of the Undetectable Firearms Act, a statute which is in effect through December 9 of this year.

The Undetectable Firearms Act prohibits the import, manufacture, sale, transport, or possession of firearms that are undetectable by metal detectors or x ray machines. Signed into law by President Reagan in 1988, this statute remains critical to public safety.

The law helps protect us from firearms that are undetectable by some of the most conventional means of firearms detection. The law prevents the commercial production and proliferation of such weapons that could be used either by individuals or organized terrorist groups seeking to commit crimes in secure areas, such as courthouses or airplanes. Unfortunately, the need for such protection has grown in recent years.

This statute was originally authorized for 10 years, and subsequently reauthorized for periods of 5 and then another 10 years. The authorization of this prohibition has been incremental because Congress recognized that technology would evolve, and that we may need to update the statute to maintain its effectiveness. In fact, this is what has transpired.

The current law has a critical loophole that may enable and encourage the production of firearms that may escape detection. Under the statute, someone may produce a plastic firearm which is detectable only because it has as metal component--which is not essential for the operation of the firearm--but is easily removable by a firearm user seeking to avoid detection.

In fact, some designs made available on the Internet to assist the manufacture of such guns using 3-D printers include just such a feature. We need to strengthen the law to address this obvious problem, and we should adopt the Undetectable Firearms Act modernization proposal sponsored by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Israel).

He is proposing that the statute be updated to require that the metal which makes a firearm detectable be included in the essential components of the firearm so that, if removed, the gun would not operate. This is a simple and effective means of addressing the problem.

While I support the reauthorization of the Undetectable Firearms Act for 10 years, a 10-year extension should not be interpreted as an agreement that the statute should remain unchanged for that entire term. We need to work quickly to update the law, but it does not appear that we will be able to do that in the time left before the statute's expiration. However, we cannot allow the law to expire and the existing--even if imperfect--protections to lapse.

Finally, with the continued toll of gun violence on our communities, Congress must act immediately on other measures to strengthen our gun laws. We are nearing the first anniversary of the killing of 20 students and six teachers at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. While such tragic mass shootings bring increased attention to the problem of gun violence, we must recognize that the scope of the problem is much greater; an average of over 30 people a day are murdered with firearms in America.

However, during this Congress, the House has taken no steps to address the problem. The Judiciary Committee has held no hearings, and has not even considered any of the other measures which have been proposed to make us safer from gun violence. For example, we must make a priority of extending the Brady Act to keep firearms out of the hands of criminals, and we should take action on H.R. 1565, the Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights Protection Act, which would expand the Brady background check requirement to firearms sold at gun shows and through commercial advertisements.

We should also consider bills such as H.R. 1318, the Youth PROMISE Act, designed to promote proven crime prevention strategies. With respect to the bill before us today, I commend the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble) for introducing the measure to extend the term of the current statute. The Undetectable Firearms Act continues to help protect public safety, and we should reauthorize it while also working to update and improve it without delay. I, therefore, urge my colleagues to support H.R. 3626.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Israel).

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from New York for his comments and for his legislation. I urge my colleagues to support the legislation.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 3626, which would reauthorize the Undetectable Firearms Act for 10 years. This statute's current authorization lasts only through December 9, and we must--at a minimum--extend the current protections.

It is critical that we maintain the prohibition against the manufacture and possession of firearms that would escape detection by metal detectors or x-ray machines.

We must take necessary steps to help protect ourselves from violent criminals and terrorists who may plan to target secure facilities such as airports, courthouses, government buildings, stadiums, schools, and hospitals, which use firearms detection equipment.

While we must ensure the protections of the Undetectable Firearms Act do not lapse, we must also take up legislation as soon as possible to address a critical shortcoming in the statute. The law, as it currently exists, would allow the production of firearms whose detectability is provided by metal parts which may be easily removed without compromising the ability to fire.

I support the efforts of Representative Steve Israel to modernize the statute to address this problem, and I urge consideration of his proposal as soon as possible.

Because of the crisis of gun violence in our country, we must consider other important bills designed to protect public safety. We urgently need to expand the Brady background check system to guns sold at gun shows and through commercial advertisements. To do this, I call upon the House to pass H.R. 1565, the ``Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights Protection Act.'' We should do that at a minimum, but we also need to consider other bills such as those to help curb illegal gun trafficking and ban the sale of high-capacity ammunition magazines.

We should also consider bills such as H.R. 1318, the Youth PROMISE Act, designed to promote proven crime prevention strategies. Instead, this House has ignored the daily toll of gun violence and refused to take action on this issue.

While I urge my colleagues to vote today to extend the Undetectable Firearms Act, I also urge the House to not shrink from its responsibility to take on the other issues related to gun violence prevention.

I thank the gentleman from Virginia, who serves ably as ranking member of the Subcommittee on Crime. I also want to thank my friend, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble), who truly is a gentleman and who will be missed, for his bipartisan work on this bill. We have worked well together, and I am deeply grateful to the gentleman for that partnership.

Mr. Speaker, in 1988 when we passed the Undetectable Firearms Act, the notion of a 3-D printed plastic firearm

slipped through metal detectors and onto our planes and into secure environments was a matter of science fiction. The problem is that today it is a reality, and in only 6 days the law banning the Undetectable Firearms Act expires, and so we have to act now.

This law was enacted under President Reagan in 1988. It was reauthorized under President Clinton, and it was reauthorized again in 2003 under President Bush. When Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton and George Bush agree on something, so should we. This has always been a matter of bipartisanship, and so we should continue that bipartisanship and pass this bill today. It is bipartisanship because it is a matter of common sense that we don't want to make it easy for terrorists and criminals to bring guns past metal detectors onto our planes and into secure environments.

As the gentleman from Virginia stated, in our view this bill is not perfect. I would have preferred to modernize the Undetectable Firearms Act to eliminate some loopholes in the law by requiring that certain metal components be permanent or not easily removed. I would have liked to close that loophole. But, frankly, I believe that even a loophole in a law is better than no law at all. A loophole can be closed down the line; that is a preferred scenario to no law at all.

So I am not going to oppose this first step because we can't get all of our steps. We will step forward and continue to support the modernization of the Undetectable Firearms Act. This for now is a very good step. It is a step that all of our colleagues should support. I again thank the gentleman from North Carolina for his bipartisan leadership, and I thank the gentleman from Virginia.

Mr. Speaker, as a Senior Member of the Judiciary Committee and the sponsor of numerous legislative proposals to reduce gun violence, I rise in strong support of extending H.R. 3626, the ``Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988'', which bans guns that can pass unnoticed through a metal detector. I support this legislation because it will help reduce gun violence and keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of terrorists. Gun violence has affected many of our districts and continues to be a pernicious problem on the national stage to which we have to address.

Every day 45 people are shot or killed because of an accident with a gun. When firearms are in the home they are 22 times more likely to be used in homicides, suicides, and accidents than in instances of self- defense. Even though 34 percent of American children live in a home with a gun, fewer than half of those homes store firearms in a way that denies access to children, meaning that guns are locked, unloaded, and separated from ammunition.

Mr. Speaker, the ``Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988'' was originally passed in 1988 and signed into law by President Reagan. It was reauthorized in 1998 and 2003. Unless reauthorized, the ban on undetectable firearms expires this week, on December 9, 2013. It is therefore imperative that we act now to extend the ban so we can reduce gun violence and enhance the safety of our first responders.

While we cannot stop every instance of gun violence, we can help reduce their prevalence. By acting now with this legislation, we can institute common-sense standards that are focused on protecting our nation from violence by those who would do us harm, without infringing on Americans' Second Amendment rights.

H.R. 2665 and H.R. 3626 can go a long way towards making our homes, schools, and streets safer for families across this country. We may not be able to prevent every gun-related tragedy from occurring in the future, but we have a responsibility to implement reasonable, common- sense standards so that innocent lives will not continue to be lost.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 3626) to extend the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 for 10 years.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, today I rise in support of H.R. 3626, a bill to extend the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 for 10 years. In 1988, Congress passed the original law that makes it illegal to manufacture, import, sell, ship, deliver, possess, transfer, or receive any firearm that is not detectable by walk-through metal detection, or any firearm with major components that do not generate an accurate image before standard airport imaging technology.

The original act passed in 1988, Mr. Speaker, and had a 10-year sunset clause which expired November 10, 1998. Congress renewed the law for 5 years in 1998 and for 10 years in 2003. The law will sunset on December 9, 2013, if it is not reauthorized again.

The original law received overwhelming bipartisan support, and so did each subsequent renewal.

I urge my colleagues to support this extension, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for speakers, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Israel) for his generous words, and I appreciate them.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 3626, currently under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.