Mexican guns, and twisted statistics

I suppose you’ve heard that 90 percent of guns seized from gun cartels in Mexico have been traced to the United States?

That’s not quite so. (/understatement)

Kelly Boggs explains:

…Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California parroted the figure at a Senate hearing, saying: “It is unacceptable to have 90 percent of the guns that are picked up in Mexico … come from the United States.”

The message so far has been clear: Guns are too easy to obtain in the United States and the Second Amendment is to blame. As a result, the gun violence in Mexico is made worse. There is one problem, though: The 90 percent figure is bogus. Fox News was suspicious of the 90 percent claim and did some digging. What the news network found is that only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been actually traced to the U.S.

There is quite a discrepancy between 17 percent and 90 percent. So which is actually correct?

An ATF spokesperson clarified the 90 percent statistic that was used by Hoover. She told FoxNews.com “that over 90 percent of the traced firearms originate from the U.S.”

The key to understanding the “90 percent” figure is the word “traced.” The vast majority of guns recovered in Mexico do not get sent back to the U.S. for tracing, because, Fox News reported, “it is obvious from their markings that they do not come from the U.S.”

ATF Special Agent William Newell told FoxNews.com that in between 2007 and 2008 Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF for tracing. Of that number, 6,000 were successfully traced and of those, approximately 90 percent — 5,114 to be exact — were found to have come from the United States.

However, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered from crime scenes during 2007 and 2008, FoxNews.com reported.

Let’s try to put things in perspective, something the aforementioned media outlets and politicians have yet to do: Of the 29,000 guns recovered at Mexican crime scenes in 2007-2008, only 5,114 — about 17 percent — have been traced to the United States. Approximately 18,000 were never submitted for tracing because it was obvious they were not from the United States.

Read the whole Kelly Boggs column at Baptist Press