Shortly before the a crucial Senate vote to expand background checks in gun transactions, Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) sent a letter to the mother of a shooting victim claiming that he was “truly sorry” for her son’s death and that “strengthening background checks is something we agree on.” A few days later, he voted to kill the background checks bill.

Caren Teves’ son Alex died during the Aurora theater mass shooting while shielding his girlfriend from the gun man’s bullets. She wrote a letter to Sen. Flake, in which she “invited him to our home to sit in our son’s chair, his empty chair” and “feel the emptiness and have dinner with us and discuss” guns. In response, Flake sent Teves a hand-written letter claiming that he supported one of the most important steps Congress could take to improve gun safety — expanding background checks:

Just days after raising Teves’ hopes that the Senate would act to prevent future mothers from experiencing the same pain inflicted upon her family, Flake voted against background checks. Flake claimed to oppose the bill because it “would expand background checks far beyond commercial sales to include almost all private transfers — including between friends and neighbors,” but this claim is false. As Mark Kelly, husband of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) lamented after seeing Flake’s explanation, “it appears he hasn’t read the bill.”

While top House and Senate recipients of National Rifle Association’s NRA Political Victory Fund PAC have mostly towed the line organization’s extreme opposition to any gun violence prevention measures, ten Senators who have received heavy financial backing from the NRA have bucked the group in light of the mass shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.

Ten Senators have received more than $10,000 from the NRA’s political action committee over their Congressional careers, yet have at least expressed an openness to some new common-sense gun laws. They include:

1. SEN. JOHN McCAIN (R-AZ) — AT LEAST $33,200

McCain said last month that while he would not support bans on assault weapons or high capacity magazines, he was open to expanding background checks: “If there are improvements that need to be made, as I said, to keep these weapons out of the hands of criminals, I’m sure all Americans, including the NRA, would agree with them, I would think.”

2. SEN. PAT TOOMEY (R-PA) — AT LEAST $27,250

Toomey said last month: “Second Amendment rights are important to many Pennsylvanians and must be protected, but there may be areas of agreement with the White House that can be addressed to improve public safety.” Reports suggest he is also open to stricter background checks.

3. SEN. MAX BAUCUS (D-MT) — AT LEAST $27,250

Baucus indicated in December that he was open to a discussion of an assault weapons ban. In January, his office said he is still undecided on expanding background checks.

4. SEN. DEAN HELLER (R-NV) — AT LEAST $21,350

Last week, Heller endorsed expanded background checks, saying: “I think it’s a reasonable step forward.”

5. SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV) — AT LEAST $19,900

Last week, Reid expressed support for expanding background checks and said
gun-magazine limits were “definitely something we have to take a look at.” He also promised to use his position as Senate Majority Leader to bring gun violence prevention measures to the Senate floor.

6. SEN. JEFF FLAKE (R-AZ) — AT LEAST $18,400

Last week, Flake reiterated his support for expanded background checks, saying: “All of us, Republicans and Democrats, have recognized that we need more effective and broader background checks than we have in the past.”

7. SEN. TOM COBURN (R-OK) — AT LEAST $17,850

Coburn is part of a bipartisan group of four Senators working to tighten background checks. He noted that “the whole goal is to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill and criminals.”

8. SEN. TIM JOHNSON (D-SD) — AT LEAST $16,250

Johnson said last month at a press conference that “one size doesn’t fit all” states for gun laws, but agreed that clip size makes some difference in preventing mass shootings and that a package of approaches should be considered. He has indicated a willingness to expand background checks as well.

9. SEN. JOE DONNELLY (D-IN) — AT LEAST $13,900

Donnelly said last month: “In 2007, just weeks after 32 people at Virginia Tech were murdered by a single gunman, Democrats and Republicans came together to improve the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, which is used to check the backgrounds of most prospective gun buyers. That system still does not work as well as it should and should be examined again in the coming weeks.”

10. SEN. JOE MANCHIN (D-WV) — AT LEAST $11,450

Manchin said last month that expanded background checks are “common sense,” asking, “Why would a legitimate gun retail shop have to go through that, but then the unfair advantage for someone at a gun show doesn’t?” In the days after Sandy Hook, Manchin was among the first to call for new action on gun violence. Like Sen. Coburn, Manchin is part of the bipartisan quartet crafting a background check proposal.

While these Senators may not receive future contribution checks from the NRA PAC, they really have little to worry about politically as a result of standing up for common-sense measures. Even most NRA members differ with the hard-line national leadership and support background checks. Last year’s elections revealed the NRA to be the paper tiger that it is: an analysis of the NRA’s spending revealed that “NRA contributions to candidates have virtually no impact on the outcome of Congressional races.” Recent polling suggests voters are more likely to punish a candidate for having NRA backing than to reward allegiance to the gun lobby.

Two years ago, when Senate Republicans needed to fill a vacant seat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, they tapped Tea Party Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) — a senator who believes that federal child labor laws, FEMA, food stamps, the FDA, Medicaid, income assistance for the poor, and even Medicare and Social Security violate the Constitution. This year, they needed to fill two seats on the Senate body responsible for overseeing the Constitution. Once again, Senate Republicans chose to fill these seats with senators who believe the Constitution in nothing more than a block of clay that can be formed into whatever the Tea Party wants it to say.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) is no stranger to conspiracy theories; he published an article last year claiming that the United Nations and George Soros are at the head of a global conspiracy to eliminate the game of golf. (Seriously. We aren’t making this up.) So his understanding of the Constitution is similarly idiosyncratic. As head of a conservative think tank’s Tenth Amendment project, Cruz co-authored an unconstitutional plan to nullify the Affordable Care Act — claiming that two states can ignore the Constitution and federal law simply by joining together in such lawlessness.

Cruz is among the most skilled attorneys in the country, but he devoted his outsized talents to reshaping the Constitution into his own far right image. His first campaign ad touted his successful work to help Texas kill a Mexican national in violation of America’s treaty obligations, and he believed in using lawsuits to tear down the health care safety net long before the Affordable Care Act’s opponents brought a completely meritless legal theory to the Supreme Court and nearly convinced the entire conservative bloc to sign onto it in its entirety. Cruz’s campaign touted his attempt to “to strike down portions of the Medicare Prescription Drug program as an unconstitutional intrusion in the sovereign authority of the States.” Although Cruz is more careful in his rhetoric than Sen. Lee, perhaps the most damning aspect of Cruz’s record is the staunch opponent of national child labor laws and Medicare’s endorsement of Cruz’s constitutional vision. In Lee’s words, “Ted is one of our nation’s leading defenders of the Tenth Amendment. He is a champion for limiting the power, size, and spending of the federal government.”

Cruz is joined on the Judiciary Committee by Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), who actually thinks his own election to the Senate should be unconstitutional. Flake endorsed repealing the Seventeenth Amendment, which replaced a system that led to “rampant and blatant corruption, letting corporations and other moneyed interests effectively buy U.S. Senators,” with our current system — electing senators.

Like Cruz, Flake also embraced rethinking the Tenth Amendment as a tool to impose Tea Party values on the country long before the Tea Party even existed. In 2000, Flake signed a position statement claiming that the Departments of Commerce and Housing and Urban Development, in addition to the National Endowments for the Arts and for the Humanities, “should be abolished, per the tenth amendment of the US Constitution.” For the record, nothing in the Tenth Amendment renders any of these things unconstitutional.

According to a report by Phoenix, Arizona’s NBC affiliate, Rep. Jeff Flake’s (R-AZ) U.S. Senate campaign called Democratic voters telling them to vote in the wrong precinct — in some cases as much as 11 miles away from their actual polling place. After telling the Democratic voters to vote in the wrong place, the calls also encourage the voter to “vote Flake for U.S. Senate.” Watch the report:

It’s unclear whether these calls were made accidentally or as part of an intentional strategy to depress the Democratic vote.

[HT: Lee Fang]