Category: Government

Wyoming’s Second Amendment Preservation Act Passes Despite Law Enforcement Opposition

While the current threat to our gun rights from the federal government is minimal, it was just a couple of years ago when we had to worry about all sorts of things. President Autopen was a big fan of gun control, and if he’d gotten his way, we’d just be left with nothing but double-barreled shotguns to shoot at bad guys through the door.

As a result, some pro-gun states started looking at ways to protect the gun rights of the people who live there. Missouri led the charge, and while that law ran into some judicial issues, the sentiment remains.

Wyoming, however, just passed a law that is essentially the same thing, but with a couple of tweaks, and law enforcement isn’t thrilled with this.

After a lively debate on the Wyoming House floor Thursday, a bill aimed at keeping federal agents from seizing Wyoming residents’ guns passed its final vote.

Having previously passed the Senate, Senate File 101, the Second Amendment Protection Act (SAPA), passed the House on third reading by a vote 40 to 21.

It must pass concurrence with both chambers before heading to Gov. Mark Gordon’s desk. Gordon vetoed a similar bill during the 2025 legislative session.

If it becomes law, SAPA will forbid Wyoming law enforcement officers from assisting federal agents in seizing residents’ firearms, ammunition or firearms accessories.

It would also allow residents whose guns have been unjustly seized to seek civil damages.

‘Sword Of Damocles’

Law enforcement officials say SAPA would undermine their joint operations with federal agents on drug busts, tracking illegal immigrants and similar cases.

During debate leading up to the vote on Thursday, dissenting lawmakers reiterated law enforcement’s concerns.

Rep. Art Washut, R-Casper, a retired peace officer, said the bill rests on a false premise.

“A false premise that the only way we can keep our Wyoming peace officers from violating your constitutional rights and your next-door neighbor’s constitutional rights is to hang the sword of Damocles over their heads with a $50,000 civil judgment on it,” he said.

Now, I get some of why law enforcement organizations dislike this bill. One argument against it is that an officer could well be sued for an action that was, at the time he carried it out, presumed to be constitutional, only for it to be ruled later as unconstitutional. That’s a fair concern, in my book, though I also think that maybe people need to understand that any gun control law should be presumed as unconstitutional until proven otherwise, but that’s just me.

However, Rep. Washut has a lot more faith in some of his former colleagues than I do.

I’m not anti-cop. I was raised by a police officer and around police officers. I know that most are good people who are trying to do a difficult job in a very difficult time.

But I also know that a lot of them are also likely to just keep their heads down and do what they’re told in way too many instances. That’s just human nature, and to think that every police officer in the state will do otherwise is naive, at best.

Others argued that this is a bill trying to solve an issue that simply doesn’t exist.

My response is that it may not exist at the moment, but it will exist sooner or later unless we’re very careful.

Of course, those who say this isn’t solving a real issue are the very same people who support making this a very real issue, so take that as you will.

But as Kentucky’s goobernor is a democrap, the legislature will need a veto-proof majority to override his expected idiocy.

Second State Seeks to Run Its Own Machine Gun Sales to Residents

Following a roadmap drawn by gun rights advocates to end-run around the Hughes Amendment, Kentucky could soon be a very select-fire-friendly state.

As previously reported by Guns.com, a bill in the West Virginia Senate would establish an Office of Public Defense tasked with selling machine guns to interested members of the public who can legally possess such a firearm. Unlike the massively inflated prices seen for “Pre-86” transferable and highly collectible machine guns that were grandfathered under the Hughes Amendment to the Firearm Owners’ Protection Act signed by President Reagan, these could be “Post-86” guns at much more affordable prices.

Taking the West Virginia bill – which was written by Gun Owners of America – as a template, Kentucky state Rep. TJ Roberts (R) last week introduced HB 749 to the legislature in the Bluegrass State.

As detailed by Roberts, who is a practicing attorney, a Kentucky Colonel, and a member of the Federalist Society:

Through our history, Americans have armed themselves in case of invasion, but the NFA has significantly overburdened this practice through an unconstitutional tax and registration regime that has not defended public safety but only harmed essential liberty.

But there is a way out!

Since 1986, Federal Law has allowed for state governments to transfer machine guns to their citizens who are otherwise allowed to possess a firearm. HB 749 would create a process to sell machine guns to legal gun owners.

Kentucky House Bill 749, co-sponsored by six fellow Republicans, has been referred to the House Committee on Committees.

Noah Pollak

One of Trump’s greatest legacies will be how he blew up a half-century of western diffidence, restraint, and failure on terrorism. As the era of Islamic terrorism began in the 1970s, western countries (very much including Israel) spun up all kinds of pseudo-sophisticated theories and excuses to avoid carrying out the only successful policy, which is killing terrorists — as many as you can, whenever you can.

There are entire university departments, think tanks, media outlets, NGOs, foundations, and political parties devoted to promoting self-defeating, enervating fictions about terrorism designed to tie the hands of the West. We just have to live with it, deal with it, accommodate it, accept the barbarism. Terrorists have grievances. It’s partly our fault, after all, because reasons. There are no military solutions. If we’re nice to the terrorists they will actually help us stabilize the region. The tropes go on forever and they are invented by people who want the west to lose, and who would rather be wrong but appear sophisticated than be right and appear crude.

Trump wants our side to win. The winning approach to terrorism is very simple. Bomb them to smithereens. Kill them off. Decapitate the regimes. Sanction them until they have no more money for jihad. Trump gets it, because unlike so many people in politics, he doesn’t care whether Harvard likes him.

Winning is going to generate a real peace dividend for America. Finally dealing with Iran — the head of the snake — will enable the US to step away from the Middle East. It will send a message to our adversaries that the big dog is still in charge. And very enjoyably, it will sweep aside decades of dumb elite groupthink about how we have no alternative but to cut deals with terrorists. Thank you President Trump.

What to do about Mexican Drug Cartels: Letters of Marque

By Lee Williams

SAF Investigative Journalism Project

Special to Liberty Park Press

The United States Congress still retains full authority to issue Letters of Marque, although none have been issued for more than a hundred years.

A Letter of Marque was actually a simple concept. They allowed private citizens in private warships to attack enemy vessels during wartime. These privateers could then take ownership of whatever plunder they seized—gold, weapons or the captured ships—after an admiralty court ruled in their favor and took a percentage of the profits.

Letters of Marque were used for hundreds of years across the globe, because they allowed a country to enlarge the size of their navy very quickly and cheaply.

The authority to issue Letters of Marque can still be found in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 11 of the United States Constitution: “The Congress shall have Power … to declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water.”

Congressman Tim Burchett, a Republican from Tennessee, and Senator Mike Lee, a Republican of Utah, who both have extremely solid Second-Amendment credentials, have drafted bills that would revitalize the Letters of Marque, in order to target Mexican drug cartels.

Congressman Burchett described the bill in a phone call Monday morning:

“It allows the president to contract out to privateers and go after the cartels,” he said. “These would be top-tier operators, SEALs, Special Forces, Marine Raiders and commando types. Some are still working as private operators. It allows private citizens to act against the cartels. In President Trump’s first term, when he got [Former Iranian Quds Force Commander Qasem] Soleimani, the Democrats just berated our military leaders because they didn’t ask for their permission. If the Democrats still want us to ask for their permission, we got some real problems. This is constitutionally provided and has been done before. We went after the Barbary pirates. It’s constitutionally provided and within the law. In this day and age, we need it. The constitution grants congress the power to grant these letters.”

Senator Lee’s bill is titled “S. 3567: Cartel Marque and Reprisal Authorization Act of 2025.”

It is described as: “A bill to authorize the President of the United States to issue letters of marque and reprisal with respect to acts of aggression against the United States by a member of a cartel, or a member of a cartel-linked organization, or any conspirator associated with a cartel, and for other purposes.”

It was introduced before the latest outbreak of cartel violence, which has targeted American tourists in Mexico.

It specifies that cartels “present an unusual and extraordinary threat to national security and foreign policy of the United States.”

Senator Lee’s bill would allow “privately armed and equipped persons” to use “all means reasonably necessary” to operate outside our borders and seize any individual and their property who the President has determined to be a member of a drug cartel, or a member of a cartel-linked organization, “who is responsible for an act of aggression against the United States.”

Congressman Burchett was asked if he has discussed his bill with President Trump.

“I have not yet, but I put it out there,” he said. “It is constitutionally sound. We live in dangerous times, and we’ve got American people who need it.”

VA undoes decades-old wrong and protects Veterans’ Second Amendment rights
February 17, 2026

WASHINGTON — The Department of Veterans Affairs today announced a major new step to protect Veterans’ Second Amendment rights. Effective immediately, VA will not report Veterans to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System as “prohibited persons” only because they need help from a fiduciary in managing their VA benefits.

This corrects a three-decade-old wrong that deprived many thousands of Veterans in VA’s Fiduciary Program of their constitutional right to own a firearm without a legal basis.

After a thorough review, VA recognized that many Veterans had been deprived of their Second Amendment rights without hearings or adequate determinations that they posed a sufficient risk of danger to themselves or others. In consultation with the Department of Justice, VA has determined this practice violates both the Gun Control Act and Veterans’ Second Amendment rights. According to federal law, a decision by a judicial or quasi-judicial body is needed before someone can be reported to NICS.

A determination by the VA that a fiduciary is needed to help manage a Veteran’s VA benefits falls far short of this legal standard.

In addition to immediately stopping the reporting of VA Fiduciary Program participants to NICS, the department is working with the FBI to remove all past VA reporting from NICS, so no Veterans are unfairly deprived of their Second Amendment rights based solely on participation in VA’s Fiduciary Program.

“Many Americans struggle with managing their finances, and Veterans’ Second Amendment rights shouldn’t be stripped just because they need help in this area. But for too long, Veterans who needed the services of a VA fiduciary were deprived of their right to bear arms,” said VA Secretary Doug Collins. “Under the leadership of President Trump, we’re correcting this injustice and ensuring Veterans get the same due-process and constitutional rights as all Americans.”

The Department of Justice supports this action.

“It is both unlawful and unacceptable for Veterans who serve our country to have their constitutional rights threatened,” said Attorney General Pamela Bondi. “It has been my pleasure to partner with Secretary Collins on this project, and I am directing the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms to review its regulations and propose changes that will prevent current and future violations of our Veterans’ Second Amendment rights.”

BLUF
The administrative state spent decades expanding its power through creative interpretations of old laws never meant to address modern policy debates. Trump is finally pushing back, and the establishment can’t stand it.

Trump Just Ended the EPA’s Climate Power Grab, and the Left Is Losing It

President Donald Trump just delivered a knockout punch to Obama-era climate hysteria, and the bureaucrats are having a total meltdown.

On Thursday, the Trump administration finalized rules repealing the EPA’s endangerment finding — that dubious 2009 determination claiming six greenhouse gases threaten human health under the Clean Air Act. “We are officially terminating the so-called endangerment finding,” Trump announced, calling the policy exactly what it was: “disastrous.”

This wasn’t just some regulatory tweak. The endangerment finding was the entire foundation for the EPA’s power grab over climate policy under the Barack Obama regime. It allowed unelected bureaucrats to impose crushing regulations on the oil and gas industry, power plants, and vehicles, all without Congress ever voting to grant them that authority. Essentially, it let EPA staffers reshape the entire American economy based on a single “finding” they issued themselves.

Trump’s repeal also axes those vehicle emission rules, since they all stem from the same flawed finding.

In addition, the Trump administration will finalize a repeal of rules that regulate greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles, since they stem from the finding. Under former President Joe Biden, the EPA sought to tighten those standards to prod the auto industry to make more fuel-efficient hybrids and electric vehicles — an effort the industry has since backtracked on.

The full text of EPA’s repeal of the endangerment finding wasn’t made available before the Trump administration announced it, but the justification will likely rely far more on legal arguments that climate pollution cannot be regulated by the landmark Clean Air Act than an outright rejection of climate science, legal experts told CNN.

Good riddance.

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Trump Wins Big as 5th Circuit Upholds Indefinite Detention Without Bond for Illegal Immigrants

A divided federal appeals court handed the Trump administration a major victory Friday, ruling that immigration authorities can detain undocumented immigrants indefinitely without bond hearings during deportation proceedings, even if they’ve lived in the United States for decades.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals 2-1 decision marks the first time an appellate court has upheld the administration’s mandatory detention policy, reversing two district court rulings and contradicting hundreds of similar cases nationwide where federal judges found the policy unlawful.

What the Court Ruled
The decision immediately affects thousands of immigrants in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi—states that house the nation’s largest concentration of immigration detention facilities. Immigrants who were previously eligible for release on bond while their deportation cases proceeded through the courts now face mandatory detention until their cases conclude, which can take months or years.

According to CNN, the ruling allows authorities to deny bond hearings to immigrants who had been living in the country unlawfully, including those previously allowed to remain free while their immigration cases moved through the system.

The two plaintiffs at the center of Friday’s ruling, Victor Buenrostro-Mendez and Jose Padron Covarrubias (both Mexican nationals) entered the United States illegally in 2009 and 2001, respectively. When Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained them in 2025, both men requested bond hearings before immigration judges. ICE denied those requests, citing a September 2025 Board of Immigration Appeals decision that adopted a new interpretation of decades-old immigration law.

Both men had initially won their cases before district court judges, who ordered them released or granted bond hearings. Friday’s appellate ruling reversed those decisions.

Overwhelming Lower Court Opposition
The ruling contradicts a wave of district court decisions. According to Politico, at least 360 federal judges rejected the Trump administration’s expanded detention policy across more than 3,000 cases, while only 27 judges backed it in approximately 130 cases.

The policy shift triggered what one government lawyer recently described as a “tsunami” of habeas corpus petitions flooding federal courts nationwide. In Minneapolis, Chief Judge Patrick Schiltz recently accused ICE of violating nearly 100 court orders directing the release of detainees.

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi called Friday’s decision “a significant blow against activist judges who have been undermining our efforts to make America safe again at every turn,” according to Reuters.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem wrote that “activist judges have ordered the release of alien after alien based on the false claim that DHS was breaking the law. Today, the first court of appeals to address the question ruled that @DHSGov was right all along.”

What Happens Next
The Fifth Circuit’s ruling applies only within its jurisdiction—Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. Other federal appeals courts are considering similar challenges, including the Seventh Circuit, which issued a preliminary ruling last year rejecting the administration’s interpretation.

Legal experts say the issue will reach the Supreme Court given the nationwide importance and the circuit split that may emerge.

“The Fifth Circuit isn’t just the most right-leaning appeals court in the country; the government drew on this panel two of that right-leaning court’s most right-leaning judges,” CNN legal analyst Steve Vladeck said. “It’s hard to imagine they’re going to get the last word.”

Finally: Trump Pulls the US Out of United Nations’ International Gun Registry Scheme

President Donald Trump just delivered a long-overdue message to the global gun confiscation cartel: America is not taking orders from the United Nations.

In a major move for national sovereignty and Second Amendment freedom, the Trump administration has formally withdrawn the United States from the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, a UN-run reporting system that gun rights advocates have warned for years is part of the international bureaucracy’s long game to pressure nations into “standardized” gun restrictions.

What Is the UN Register of Conventional Arms?

UNROCA is a so-called “voluntary” United Nations registry where participating countries report information about weapons transfers, including categories of conventional arms and, in many cases, small arms and light weapons.

Supporters claim it promotes “transparency.”

But gun owners know how this game works.

Transparency is always the excuse and control is always the goal. Because once international bureaucrats start collecting data, they don’t stop at tracking tanks and fighter jets.

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HHS announces US has completed its withdrawal from the World Health Organization.

The Department of Health and Human Services and the State Department announced Thursday that the United States has completed its withdrawal from the World Health Organization over its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

President Donald Trump signed the executive order that began the process of withdrawing from the global organization last year, on the first day of his second term.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. also cited issues with the organization’s failure to adopt urgent reforms, and its inability to demonstrate independence from the political influence of WHO member states.

“Today, the United States withdrew from the World Health Organization, freeing itself from its constraints, as President Trump promised on his first day in office,” the secretaries said in a joint statement. “This action responds to the WHO’s failures during the COVID-19 pandemic and seeks to rectify the harm from those failures inflicted on the American people.”

The departments claimed the WHO delayed declaring a global public health emergency and pandemic during the early stages of COVID-19 and failed to adopt meaningful reforms to address political influence and poor coordination in the aftermath of the global crisis.

The secretaries added that the United States will still interact with the organization to effectuate its withdrawal, but that all funding for, and staffing of, WHO initiatives have ceased.

DOJ: Ban on mailing concealable firearms unconstitutional, can’t be enforced

A nearly 100-year-old federal ban on mailing handguns through the U.S. Postal Service is unconstitutional and cannot be enforced, according to an opinion released Thursday by the Department of Justice (DOJ).

The 15-page opinion concluded that a 1927 law, which made it illegal to use the Postal Service to mail concealable firearms, such as pistols and revolvers, infringes on the Second Amendment.

“Section 1715 makes it difficult to travel with arms for lawful purposes, including self-defense, target shooting, and hunting,” wrote T. Elliot Gaiser, the assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel.

“The statute also imposes significant barriers to shipping constitutionally protected firearms as articles of commerce, which interferes with citizens’ incidental rights to acquire and maintain arms,” the opinion continued.

Postal Service policy mandates that nonmailable firearms found in the mail stream “must be immediately reported to the United States Postal Inspection Service,” and investigations are then referred to the relevant U.S. attorney’s office for prosecution.

The agency categorizes “pistols, revolvers, and other firearms capable of being concealed on a person,” including short-barreled shotguns and rifles, as handguns. It also notes there are no restrictions on mailing rifles and shotguns between licensed dealers, manufacturers and importers.

Major private carriers, including UPS and FedEx, also restrict the shipping of firearms to only licensed dealers, which the opinion argued effectively creates a “complete ban” for unlicensed people.

The opinion acknowledged some limitations, finding the law was only unconstitutional related to handguns but still applied to undetectable firearms, such as pen guns.

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Rep. Eric Burlison: ‘Real Freedom Means Less Government Interference,’ End the ATF

Rep. Eric Burlison (R) is beginning 2026 right where he spent 2025, namely, pushing for the end of the ATF’s registration schemes and for the abolition of the agency itself.

He used a post on January 11, 2026, to remind Americans that the $200 tax on suppressors was done away via the language of the One Big Beautiful Bill, yet the ATF continues registering the devices. In so doing, the agency creates “busywork” that slows the transfer of a suppressor, “holding gun owners hostage with delays and excuses.”

Burlison pointed out that the zeroing of the $200 federal has resulted in a “surge” in suppressor purchases, which has translated into a backlog at the ATF as the agency finds itself overwhelmed with the registration workload: “…the ATF wasn’t ready for the surge in registrations and crashed their system. Unacceptable! Now they’re still demanding paperwork for no reason. Time to end this pointless registry entirely…”

He wrote, “I sent a letter demanding fixes, but the real solution is abolishing the ATF altogether. We don’t need unelected bureaucrats infringing on our rights. Congress must act to dismantle this relic and restore liberty!”

Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Withdraws the United States from International Organizations that Are Contrary to the Interests of the United States

WITHDRAWING FROM INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed a Presidential Memorandum directing the withdrawal of the United States from 66 international organizations that no longer serve American interests.

  • The Memorandum orders all Executive Departments and Agencies to cease participating in and funding 35 non-United Nations (UN) organizations and 31 UN entities that operate contrary to U.S. national interests, security, economic prosperity, or sovereignty.
  • This follows a review ordered earlier this year of all international intergovernmental organizations, conventions, and treaties that the United States is a member of or party to, or that the United States funds or supports.
  • These withdrawals will end American taxpayer funding and involvement in entities that advance globalist agendas over U.S. priorities, or that address important issues inefficiently or ineffectively such that U.S. taxpayer dollars are best allocated in other ways to support the relevant missions.

RESTORING AMERICAN SOVEREIGNTY: President Trump is ending U.S. participation in international organizations that undermine America’s independence and waste taxpayer dollars on ineffective or hostile agendas.

  • Many of these bodies promote radical climate policies, global governance, and ideological programs that conflict with U.S. sovereignty and economic strength.
  • American taxpayers have spent billions on these organizations with little return, while they often criticize U.S. policies, advance agendas contrary to our values, or waste taxpayer dollars by purporting to address important issues but not achieving any real results.
  • By exiting these entities, President Trump is saving taxpayer money and refocusing resources on America First priorities.

PUTTING AMERICA FIRST ON THE GLOBAL STAGE: President Trump has consistently fought to protect U.S. sovereignty and ensure international engagements serve American interests.

  • Immediately upon returning to office, President Trump initiated the withdrawal of the United States from the World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Agreement.
  • On Day One of his Administration, President Trump also signed a Presidential Memorandum to notify the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development that its Global Tax Deal has no force or effect in the United States, and direct an investigation into whether foreign countries have tax rules in place that are extraterritorial or disproportionately affect American companies.
  • Just weeks later, President Trump signed an Executive Order withdrawing the United States from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and prohibiting any future funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency for the Near East (UNRWA).
  • He has prioritized American interests by redirecting focus and resources toward domestic priorities such as infrastructure, military readiness, and border security, and acting swiftly to protect American companies from foreign interference.

Montana Accidentally Made Things Right on Gun-Free School Zones

I don’t think that schools should be totally gun-free zones. While I get that Bruen said that sensitive places could be gun-free, and schools are probably about as sensitive a place as you can name, I don’t think that barring lawful carry in schools for staff and parents is a winning strategy. After all, how many school shootings have we seen despite the schools having this status?

Yeah, plenty.

But the truth is that in most places, schools are as off-limits as they come. At least they are when it’s K-12 schools. Colleges are a different matter in many states, but below that level? The rules are firm.

And those rules include a “buffer zone” of sorts that prohibits the carrying of firearms around the school, regardless of most any other factor.

And Montana accidentally exposed a loophole and made things right, even if that’s not quite what they were trying to do.

Sometimes the most consequential gun control stories don’t start with a bill banning firearms. They start with lawmakers trying to expand freedom — and discovering that the Constitution doesn’t bend the way critics expect it to.

That is exactly what just happened in Montana.

In an effort to strengthen the right to carry, Montana lawmakers may have effectively erased gun-free school zones everywhere except on school property itself. Not through activism. Not through litigation designed to gut federal law. But through their own permitless carry statutes — and a federal court noticed.

The result is a ruling that has left gun-control advocates furious, school administrators uneasy, and Second Amendment supporters pointing out an inconvenient truth: when the state recognizes the right to carry as a right, federal carve-outs start to fall apart.

It all boils down to a guy who would go for a walk near a school. Sometimes, he’d carry a gun openly, and other times, it would be concealed. Local police told the school that he wasn’t breaking any state law, so they couldn’t do anything about it. The school moved kids away from the man and tried to erect visual barriers so no one would see him.

Eventually, the feds stepped in, arrested him, and saw the whole thing thrown out.

Why?

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that because Montana statutorily authorizes concealed carry for eligible citizens, those citizens qualify for the federal licensing exception.

In plain terms: if everyone is licensed by law, then everyone qualifies for the exemption.

The court dismissed the charges and made it clear that the outcome wasn’t an accident; it was the logical result of Montana’s legislative choices.

The ruling emphasized that Montana did not delegate licensing authority to agencies or local officials. The Legislature itself granted the authority. Congress, the court said, did not clearly prohibit states from doing that.

As a result of that ruling, though, gun-free school zones are confined exclusively to the school itself, not the area around the school.

If schools are going to be gun-free zones, this is how it should be. The idea that the area around the school is also gun-free is a major problem because, frankly, people travel by those schools all the time. They have to in order to get to where they’re going, and unless they’re licensed under state law, they may be committing a felony.

The “buffer zone” thing has always been wrong, but Montana accidentally fixed it for residents there. Instead of just saying a license isn’t needed, they licensed everyone, which had an unintended but positive effect regarding the whole school zone thing.

Maybe other states should address this via their own constitutional carry laws. Most didn’t take quite the same approach as Montana, but they could make that happen and change things once and for all.

It would be a win for gun rights, sanity, and everything else decent in the universe, and the anti-gunners would still have their allegedly gun-free schools.

Again, not that it seems to do much good.

Gov Sanders rejects demand from legal group to undo Christmas closure: ‘I will do no such thing’
The Freedom From Religion Foundation took issue with Sanders’ Christmas message

 Arkansas Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders is firing back at a legal group who took issue with her recent move to close state offices on Friday, December 26 to celebrate Christmas and give employees more time with their families.

After issuing a proclamation closing state offices for Christmas, Sanders received a letter from the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), a group focused on the separation of church and state, calling for her to reverse the move and claiming it was unconstitutional.

In a response letter, obtained by Fox News Digital, Sanders told FFRF she “will do no such thing.”

12.19.25-freedom-from-religion-foundation-response-letter

Senator Mike Lee’s idea, noted back in February gathers notice.

Avast, Me Hearties! Lawmakers Want Congress to Issue ‘Letters of Marque’ to Go After Cartel Drug Boats

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) wants to revive an ancient and honorable custom: grant Congress the authority to issue Letters of Marque that would allow U.S. citizens and others to legally interdict drug boats and other cartel-owned ships and property, to be sold off. At least some of the proceeds would go to the “privateers.”

The idea of giving Letters of Marque to employ private citizens to police the oceans isn’t new. As recently as Sept. 11, 2001, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) introduced a bill to grant Letters of Marque that would have legally allowed American citizens to go after Osama Bin Laden and his assets.

During the Revolutionary War, the U.S. didn’t have much of a Navy. It was up to privateers operating with Letters of Marque, raiding British shipping and occasionally attacking British warships, to show the flag and gain much-needed hard currency for the American cause.

Reviving the custom would not be welcomed by our allies or enemies.

“Cartels have replaced corsairs in the modern era, but we can still give private American citizens and their businesses a stake in the fight against these murderous foreign criminals,” Lee, who is a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said. “The Cartel Marque and Reprisal Reauthorization Act will revive this historic practice to defend our shores and seize cartel assets.”

“Corsairs” were pirates operating near the Barbary Coast in North Africa in the early 19th century. They routinely stopped American ships, stole the cargo, and held Americans for ransom.

Congress can issue Letters of Marque, having been vested with the power in Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. It gives Congress the power to “declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water.”

The Declaration of Paris in 1856 supposedly abolished “privateering” and Letters of Marque. It was signed by almost all the major seafaring powers except the United States. Does this mean the U.S. can hire privateers anyway?

There’s nothing in American law that would forbid the practice. While the U.S. could theoretically issue a letter, doing so would likely be seen as a violation of customary international law. “Customary” international law refers to the fact that, because the U.S. hasn’t issued any Letters of Marque for more than 200 years, we have tacitly acknowledged the legality of the law and are a de facto signatory to it.

China has a long history of engaging in irregular coercive activities, including harassing neighboring countries’ oil and gas exploration, fishing fleets, and replenishment of military installations.

Other nations might treat American privateers as pirates rather than lawful combatants, meaning they wouldn’t have the legal protections typically given to military prisoners of war. That’s only one headache Donald Trump would have if Congress went ahead and authorized the issuing of the letters.

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BLUF
What am I getting at? If you look at what Pete Hegseth has actually done, it was long overdue, and he’s doing it very well. And the criticism against him has two themes: It’s entirely political, and it’s not symmetric. Everything they said about Pete Hegseth in a negative context could have been applied to both the Obama and Biden administration, and much more egregiously.

Hegseth Did What Biden Called ‘Impossible.’

Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. A lot of officials in the Trump Cabinet are under a lot of criticism, as we’d expect, from the Left. But one has, I think, both got more criticism and more unfair criticism than any other Cabinet member. And that’s Pete Hegseth, the secretary of war—the newly renamed Department of Defense.

Let’s just review a little bit of his record because it does not justify the level of invective that the Left, and even some people on the Right in Congress and the Republican Party, have unfairly attacked him.

We were told during the Biden administration that the recruitment for the Air Force, the Army, the Navy, and even in one case, I think one year, the Marines, was off some 40,000 to 50,000 recruits. And the Pentagon’s reaction under Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was, as we heard this echoed by a lot of the four-star admirals and generals, well, people are out of shape. They’re in gangs. They take drugs. They are wanted by private enterprise.

We have to compete with all of the excuses other than the real cause. The real cause was, as Pete Hegseth said when he came in, that people felt that the military was not emphasizing combat, battlefield efficacy. It was turning into a social justice “program.”

The subtext of Pete Hegseth’s point was that there was a particular demographic, white males from rural and often southern locales. They had died at twice their numbers in the demographic in Iraq and Afghanistan, and they weren’t joining.

Some of them were not joining because of the 8,500, maybe 8,000-8,500, that had natural immunity from prior COVID-19 infections. And yet, they did not want this experimental mRNA vaccine, and they were drummed out en masse. The majority of those fit this demographic.

The others felt that under the DEI obsessions with race and sexual orientation and gender, that people would be recruited, retained, promoted on criteria other than battlefield efficacy. So, they just stayed away from what they felt was a hostile environment. Didn’t help when then-Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley and Lloyd Austin told the nation before Congress that they were going to invest white supremacy following the death of George Floyd.

That’s over with. There is a record number of Army recruits. The military has met all of its recruiting. That is equivalent to the dramatic revolution on the southern border. Nobody thought we could close the border. We did. Nobody thought we could get recruitment back. Pete Hegseth did.

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Arkansas Attorney General Clarifies State’s Concealed Carry Law

On November 14, 2025, the Arkansas Attorney General (AG), Tim Griffin, clarified Arkansas law about the legal carry of firearms. The three questions to be answered included: publicly owned buildings or facilities, the legal definition of an “athletic event” in Arkansas law, and what type of carry is prohibited in statutorily prohibited spaces. The questions were asked by the Honorable Sonia Eubanks Barker, a Republican state representative with a pro-Second Amendment reputation.

AG opinions are not binding on judges. They are statements of what the Attorney General believes the law to be. They are often taken into account by prosecutors when determining whether to prosecute in a given circumstance.

AG Griffin’s response was detailed and encyclopedic. It is well-crafted and an excellent read. The response explains Arkansas’s statutory law about the carry of firearms in considerable detail. The response also explains some of the intricacies of law and statutory interpretation. In addition to the lengthy response, the AG  provides brief summaries of his findings. AG Griffin found:

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