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Taxing $1,000 per Gun Became a Reality in One U.S. Territory — and Some Worry It Could Spread
(Photo by Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Taxing $1,000 per Gun Became a Reality in One U.S. Territory — and Some Worry It Could Spread

“The left is now seeking to tax guns out of existence.”

Residents of the Northern Marianas Islands, a U.S. territory, will be paying a tax of $1,000 per gun as part of a sweeping gun regulation package was approved.

Gov. Ralph Torres signed the gun tax and regulation bill into law Monday and stressed that his first priority is the safety of law enforcement and the community.

“It’s something that none of us want, and we want to make it as strict as possible,” Torres said in a statement.

Photo: Shutterstock Photo credit: Shutterstock

Last year, the city of Seattle approved a $25 tax per firearm, which was called a "gun violence tax."

Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, blasted these as examples of the left targeting guns and noted that Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has backed taxes on guns in the past.

“The left is now seeking to tax guns out of existence,” Norquist said in a statement Monady. “The Second Amendment makes it difficult to legally ban guns, but Hillary has led the way to explaining you can achieve the same thing with high taxes.”

While she was first lady, in 1993, Clinton called for a 25 percent sales tax on guns.

Gun control has been a quandary in the Northern Marianas Islands in recent weeks.

On March 28, Chief Judge Ramona Villagomez Manglona, of the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands, ruled the islands’ 40-year-old handgun ban was unconstitutional “because the people of the Commonwealth are part of the American people who have overwhelmingly chosen handguns as their principal means of self-defense, the Second Amendment protects that right here as well."

In lieu of a total ban, the House and Senate of the territory approved a package that includes a $1,000 per pistol excise tax.

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