ICYMI: PolitiFact Confirms Threat of Terrorists Exploiting Gun Background Check System, Which Ayotte Has Voted Against Strengthening

Press Release

Today, PolitiFact confirmed a recent statement from Governor Hassan that terrorists are trying to exploit federal laws in order to obtain guns.

Senator Ayotte has repeatedly voted against expanding criminal background checks for gun purchases, meaning dangerous individuals, including suspected terrorists, can continue to simply go online or to gun shows to purchase guns.

Click here for the full story or see below for excerpts:

As gun policy takes a central role in New Hampshire's U.S. Senate race, Democrat Maggie Hassan is warning that terrorists are trying to exploit federal laws to obtain firearms.

Hassan brought up the point in the first televised debate against Republican incumbent Kelly Ayotte.

"With her solution, terrorists can still today -- and by the way ISIS knows it, they have been advertising it -- buy guns online and at gun shows in the United States of America," Hassan said on the debate stage at New England College.

Is it really a point terrorists are spreading? Let's look.

PolitiFact has already looked into Hassan's claim that Ayotte voted against a proposal to expand background checks and found it Mostly True…

Our ruling

Hassan said the Islamic State knows its followers can buy firearms "online and at gun shows" and is "advertising it."

An interview in the New York Times with a former Islamic State recruit shows group members acknowledge American recruits can buy guns, so long as they don't have a record. And a 2011 video from an al Qaeda spokesman urges terrorists to buy guns in the United States and use them against Western governments.

… We rate the claim Mostly True.

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