Eddie Edwards, the Republican nominee for the open New Hampshire 1st Congressional District seat in the U.S. House, has endorsed a total repeal of the 1993 Brady law that requires instant background checks for most gun purchases — a position that puts him to the right of even the National Rifle Association. But when asked in a CNN interview over the weekend about this extreme position, he dissembled, accusing everyone else of not comprehending the issue.
After ThinkProgress reported last month about Edwards and his support for scrapping background checks and the law that prohibits some people convicted of domestic abuse from owning guns, CNN’s Van Jones broached the topic with him on Saturday.
“Would you repeal the Brady Act? Would you get the federal government completely out of the gun business? Yes or no, should the federal government play a role in making sure that guns are regulated?” Jones asked.
“That’s two separate questions,” Edwards shot back. “People support background checks, right before you purchase a weapon. That’s fine.”
“When people start talking about universal background checks, I think that stems into an area people don’t really understand,” he added.
But while he is correct that the public widely supports background checks for those purchasing a gun — indeed, the vast majority of Americans support expanding the current law to also require background checks for so-called “private sales” at gun shows — his “that’s fine” suggests that he supports keeping the current system. He does not, by his own admission.
His candidate questionnaire for the white-supremacist-tied Gun Owner of America — which he even posted on his campaign website — makes clear he would repeal the background check system entirely.
The Cook Political report lists the open New Hampshire 1st as a competitive race, but moved it from “leans Democrat” to “likely Democratic” after Edwards won the GOP nomination.