The Myth of 90 Percent: Only a Small Fraction of Guns in Mexico Come From U.S.
Hillary has a math problem!
FOX…You’ve heard this shocking “fact” before — on TV and radio, in newspapers, on the Internet and from the highest politicians in the land: 90 percent of the weapons used to commit crimes in Mexico come from the United States.
—Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said it to reporters on a flight to Mexico City.
– CBS newsman Bob Schieffer referred to it while interviewing President Obama.
– California Sen. Dianne Feinstein said at a Senate hearing: “It is unacceptable to have 90 percent of the guns that are picked up in Mexico and used to shoot judges, police officers and mayors … come from the United States.”
– William Hoover, assistant director for field operations at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, testified in the House of Representatives that “there is more than enough evidence to indicate that over 90 percent of the firearms that have either been recovered in, or interdicted in transport to Mexico, originated from various sources within the United States.”
There’s just one problem with the 90 percent “statistic” and it’s a big one:
It’s just not true.
In fact, it’s not even close. The fact is, only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been traced to the U.S…..
John,
The article says that 90% of the guns that were traced come from the US. They don’t trace all the guns. The article even undercuts it’s main point.
NAFTA promoters promised us we would dominate the markets for guns, explosives, and narcotics in Mexico.
This is just another NAFTA dissapointment.
FYI
….In 2007-2008, according to ATF Special Agent William Newell, Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF for tracing. Close to 6,000 were successfully traced — and of those, 90 percent — 5,114 to be exact, according to testimony in Congress by William Hoover — were found to have come from the U.S.
But in those same two years, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered at crime scenes.
In other words, 68 percent of the guns that were recovered were never submitted for tracing. And when you weed out the roughly 6,000 guns that could not be traced from the remaining 32 percent, it means 83 percent of the guns found at crime scenes in Mexico could not be traced to the U.S…….
Wow. Who would you believe, Faux News or ATF?
Tough call.