Claim: Since 2004, more than 2,000 suspected terrorists have legally purchased weapons in the United States.
Verdict: SUPPORTS

Retrieved passages:
title: Small Arms Survey
text: as possessed by every law enforcement agency in the United States put together. In April and May 2018, Americans bought 4.7 million guns, that's more than all the firearms stockpiled by the United States military. In 2017, Americans bought 25.2 million guns, that's 2.5 million more guns than possessed by every law enforcement agency in the world put together. Between 2012 and 2017, Americans bought 135 million guns, that's 2 million more guns than the combined stockpile of all the world's armed forces. The data offered by the Small Arms Survey has several times been denounced as misleading or incorrect.

title: No Fly List
text: explosives under current federal law," and individuals on the No Fly List are not barred from purchasing guns. According to GAO data, between 2004 and 2010, people on terrorism watch lists—including the No Fly List as well as other separate lists—attempted to buy guns and explosives more than 1,400 times, and succeeded in 1,321 times (more than 90% of cases). Senator Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey repeatedly introduced legislation to bar individuals on the terror watch lists (such as the No Fly List) from buying firearms or explosives, but these efforts have not succeeded. Senator Dianne Feinstein of California revived

title: Gun control
text: law enforcement agencies, and armed forces. Of these firearms 650 million, or 75%, are held by civilians. U.S. civilians account for 270 million of this total. A further 200 million are controlled by state military forces. Law enforcement agencies have some 26 million small arms. Non-state armed groups have about 1.4 million firearms. Finally, gang members hold between 2 and 10 million small arms. Together, the small arms arsenals of non-state armed groups and gangs account for, at most, 1.4% of the global total. Barring a few exceptions, most countries in the world allow civilians to purchase firearms subject to

title: National Security Entry-Exit Registration System
text: 330 "known criminals" and three "known terrorists"; The spokesperson made these remarks in order to advocate for renewed funding for the program, for which the Bush administration was requesting $16.8 million per fiscal year. However, by 1 December 2016, "[n]o known terrorism convictions resulted from the program," according to a letter from some Democratic Members of Congress and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. By January 2003, at least 138,000 individuals were registered in NSEERS, according to testimony by the Department of Homeland Security to Congress. As of May 2003, 82,581 individuals had complied with the domestic portion of the

title: ATF gunwalking scandal
text: the U.S. Attorney's Office—to eliminate a trafficking organization—and the belief that confronting subjects and seizing firearms could compromise that goal." By June 2010, suspects had purchased 1,608 firearms at a cost of over US$1 million at Phoenix-area gun shops. At that time, the ATF was also aware of 179 of those weapons being found at crime scenes in Mexico, and 130 in the United States. As guns traced to Fast and Furious began turning up at violent crime scenes in Mexico, ATF agents stationed there also voiced opposition. On the evening of December 14, 2010, U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian

title: U.S. government response to the September 11 attacks
text: the attacks, 762 suspects were taken into custody in the United States. On December 12, 2001, Fox News reported that some 60 Israelis were among them. Federal investigators were reported to have described them as part of a long-running effort to spy on American government officials. A "handful" of these Israelis were described as active Israeli military or intelligence operatives. In a letter to the editor, Ira Glaser, former head of the ACLU, claimed that none of those 762 detainees were charged with terrorism. "The Justice Department inspector general's report implies more than the violation of the civil liberties of

title: Gun ownership
text: (39.7 million) combined. American civilians own more guns "than those held by civilians in the other top 25 countries combined." "American civilians own nearly 100 times as many firearms as the U.S. military and nearly 400 times as many as law enforcement." Americans bought more than 2 million guns in May, 2018, alone. That is more than twice as many guns, as possessed by every law enforcement agency in the United States put together. In April and May 2018, U.S. civilians bought 4.7 million guns, which is more than all the firearms stockpiled by the United States military. In 2017,

title: Mexican Drug War
text: from Central America. However some grenades are also smuggled from the US to Mexico or stolen from the Mexican military. DHS officials have stated that the statistic is misleading: out of approximately 30,000 weapons seized in drug cases in Mexico in 2004–2008, 7,200 appeared to be of U.S. origin, approximately 4,000 were found in ATF manufacturer and importer records, and 87 percent of those—3,480—originated in the United States. In an effort to control smuggling of firearms, the U.S. government is assisting Mexico with technology, equipment and training. Project Gunrunner was one such efforts between the U.S. and Mexico to collaborate

title: ETrace
text: Mexico reported they held 305,424 confiscated firearms. Regardless of innocence, first purchaser American gun owner names and addresses, detailed personal information from gun purchases (from form 4473 - including date of birth, possibly Social Security Number), and detail on other guns purchased by owner name is directly available to some 35 foreign governments, including governments with known corruption issues. Over 360,000 trace requests were processed in fiscal year 2014. Trace requests have been accepted by ATF from over 60 foreign governments (some with terrorist connections). ATF admits the identity of the firearms purchaser provided to a foreign law enforcement agency

title: Arms Export Control Act
text: and Customs Enforcement (ICE) conducts an industry outreach program called the Project Shield America to prevent foreign adversaries, terrorists, and criminal networks from obtaining U.S. munitions and strategic technology. From 1963 to 1973, 128 nations received $2.5 trillion in weapons and services, the majority from the United States. Law only required that the Secretary of State report “significant” arms sales to Congress, semi-annually. In the early 1970s, legislators moved to become involved in deciding to whom arm sales could be made and under what circumstances. Concern over arms sales increased significantly in the summer of 1973, when news surfaced of

title: Domestic terrorism
text: web forums that support terrorist activities, with around 10,000 of them actively maintained. 80% of these sites are on U.S.-based servers. According to the Congressional Research Service’s study, "American Jihadist Terrorism: Combatting a Complex Threat," between May 2009 and November 2010, law enforcement made arrests related to 22 homegrown jihadist-inspired terror plots by American citizens or legal residents of the U.S. This is a significant increase over the 21 plots caught in the seven interim years after the September 11 attacks. During these seven years, two plots resulted in attacks, compared to the two attacks between May 2009 and November

title: Gun ownership
text: million). Law enforcement agencies control about 23 million (about 2 percent) of the global total of small arms. "Americans made up 4 percent of the world's population but owned about 46 percent of the entire global stock of 857 million civilian firearms." U.S civilians own 393 million guns. That is 3 times as many guns as the armed forces of the Russian Federation (30.3 million), China (27.5 million), North Korea (8.4 million), Ukraine (6.6 million), United States (4.5 million), India (3.9 million), Vietnam (3.8 million), Iran (3.3 million), South Korea (2.7 million), Pakistan (2.3 million), and all the other countries

title: Gun violence in the United States
text: by the ATF released in 1999 found that 0.4% of federally licensed dealers sold half of the guns used criminally in 1996 and 1997. This is sometimes done through "straw purchases." State laws, such as those in California, that restrict the number of gun purchases in a month may help stem such "straw purchases." States with gun registration and licensing laws are generally less likely to have guns initially sold there used in crimes. Similarly, crime guns tend to travel from states with weak gun laws to states with strict gun laws. An estimated 500,000 guns are stolen each year,

title: Mérida Initiative
text: as Washington state, and that Texas, Arizona and California are the three most prolific source states, respectively, for firearms subsequently illegally trafficked to Mexico. Since 1996, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) has traced more than 62,000 firearms smuggled into Mexico from the United States. ATF officials report that many firearms recovered and traced in Mexico came from U.S. gun dealers, and about 55% of these guns were identified as assault rifles. The Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, reported that only 18,585 of the firearms seized by Mexican authorities were successfully traced to the

title: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
text: White Papers'. These have no legal bearing at the moment. Since 2001, ATF Agents have recommended over 10,000 felons every year for federal prosecution for firearms possession through the Project Safe Neighborhoods framework. In PSN's first year, 2001–2002, over 7,700 of these cases resulted in convictions with an average sentence of over five years per defendant. This number had risen to over 12,000 prosecutions in FY 2007. The annual FBI Uniform Crime Report (UCR) demonstrated that throughout the decade of 2001–2010, the reduction of violent crime offenses in United States Districts with dedicated Project Safe Neighborhood Agents and United States

title: Crime in the United States
text: been 185,718 homicides from use of a firearm and 291,571 suicides using a firearm. Despite a significant increase in the sales of firearms since 1994, the US has seen a drop in the annual rate of homicides using a firearm from 7.0 per 100,000 population in 1993 to 3.6 per 100,000. In the ten years between 2000 and 2009, the ATF reported 37,372,713 clearances for purchase, however, in the four years between 2010 and 2013, the ATF reported 31,421,528 clearances. According to a 2004 study by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, looking at the period from 1981 to 1999, the

title: Gun ownership
text: Americans bought 25.2 million guns, that's 2.5 million more guns than possessed by every law enforcement agency in the world put together. Between 2012 and 2017, U.S. civilians bought 135 million guns, that's 2 million more guns than the combined stockpile of all the world's armed forces. Some studies suggest that higher rates of gun ownership are associated with higher homicide rates, although Gary Kleck argues that the highest-quality studies show that gun ownership does not increase homicide rates. Higher rates of gun ownership are also associated with higher suicide rates and higher accidental gun death rates. The availability of

title: 2009 Bronx terrorism plot
text: buy guns from a dealer in Newburgh; however, the dealer had sold out. They then drove downstate and bought a $700 pistol from a Bloods gang leader in Brooklyn. On May 6, 2009, the men traveled to Stamford, Connecticut, to pick up what they believed to be a surface-to-air guided-missile system and three improvised explosive devices, all of which were incapable of actually being used. On the way there, one of the men believed they were being followed by federal agents. They returned to Newburgh until they were satisfied that they were safe, and then turned around and headed back

title: Mérida Initiative
text: United States in the last five years (2005–2009) out of 66,028 firearms submitted by Mexico to ATF for tracing. Mexico only submits firearms for tracing if it is believed that there is a reasonable chance of them being from the United States. In a 2009 GAO report, the DHS pointed out that there were only 3,480 U.S. origin guns of 4,000 successfully weapons traced by ATF out a total of 35,000 firearms seized in Mexico between 2004 and 2008. Mexican officials submitted approximately 32% of the guns they seized to the ATF for tracing. The ATF was able to trace

title: National Tracing Center
text: indexed 100 million such records, with over 300 million additional records scheduled to be added over the following two years. (Commerce in Firearms, ATF, 2000) Over 400 million firearm transaction records were to be indexed by 2002 – about twice the total estimated number of firearms in the United States at that time. According to gun rights advocates, which have long opposed any centralized, searchable registry of firearms sales, and notwithstanding the conclusions of the Government Accounting Office in 1996 that this system complied with legislative restrictions, this combination of automated and manual retrieval of individual sales records is a