A group of House Republicans is urging Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to halt any remaining gun control efforts within his department, which they claim is in direct violation of federal law.

“We write to you today to urge you to protect the Second Amendment from attacks by a partisan and weaponized Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and National Institutes of Health (NIH)—which became a dangerous threat to gun ownership under the Biden Administration,” the letter led by Rep. Diana Harshbarger, R-Tenn., — first reported by Fox News — read.

The lawmaker’s letter also asked Kennedy to reverse a Biden-era policy declaring gun violence a “public health crisis.”

“Treating firearm-related violent crime as a public health issue may start with a study about gun control but ends with tyranny,” it said.

In 1996, Congress passed the Dickey Amendment as part of a spending bill, prohibiting federal funds from being used to advocate for gun control. A 2018 spending bill eased those restrictions slightly, permitting the CDC to study the causes of gun violence.

However, a letter signed by 15 House Republican lawmakers argued that the Biden administration had overstepped the boundaries set by the amended language.

“[T]he Biden White House and gun control advocates censored self-defense statistics from the CDC website, statistics that would have helped explain the importance of the Second Amendment to our citizens,” they wrote. 

“Meanwhile, the Biden Administration also weaponized millions of dollars of research funding appropriated by Congress in good faith for ‘Firearm Injury and Mortality Prevention Research’ to promote gun control.”

The letter highlighted several gun control-related initiatives by the Biden administration’s Department of Health and Human Services, including a $428,000 study on “episodic crime reports” and portrayals of violence that contribute to victim blaming and “racist stereotypes.”

The letter also pointed to $1.1 million in funding to explore the link between “lawful gun ownership and risk,” along with hundreds of thousands of dollars directed toward gun confiscation efforts and other firearm-related policies in states such as Michigan and California.

“Congress intended for the CDC and NIH to conduct research on medical procedures, practices, treatments, medicines, and therapies related to firearm injuries and recovery,” the lawmakers wrote. “Instead, this funding has been weaponized to promote and advocate gun control in direct violation of federal law.”

They urged Kennedy to end any remaining funding that could be in violation of the Dickey Amendment and restore “censored” statistics on self-defense on the CDC website, Fox added.