BREAKING: House passes “Assault Weapons” Ban 217-213.⁰⁰But, anti-gunners won’t stop here. Their ultimate goal is total firearm confiscation and the end of the Second Amendment.⁰⁰This is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause. pic.twitter.com/bUvXScFp0u
— Gun Owners of America (@GunOwners) July 29, 2022
Category: RKBA
Bloomberg gathers anti-gun mayors to plan post-Bruen moves
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has made it his life’s mission to essentially erode the Second Amendment to the point that it means nothing.
Standing in his way, however, is that whole pesky “constitutionality” thing.
The Bruen decision was undoubtedly a major setback for the former mayor and his anti-gun allies. Now, as NSSF’s Larry Keane notes, it seems they’re getting together to plan their next step in attacking our rights.
Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) is the gun control kitchen cabinet of billionaire Michael Bloomberg, ever on his quest to deny God-given rights to law-abiding Americans even while he enjoys them. Following the Supreme Court’s ruling in Bruen, Bloomberg summoned his coterie to New York City.
Reporting for Duty
The cattle call included a who’s-who of gun control mayors. Many have defunded their police departments, restricted gun rights and some have already been rebuffed by courts for misguided local policies.
Baltimore Democratic Mayor Brandon Scott joined the meeting, as did St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones, Little Rock, Ark., Mayor Frank Scott and Buffalo, N.Y., Mayor Byron Brown. Kansas City’s Mayor Quinton Lucas attended too – he was just named “Gun Sense Lawmaker of the Year” by Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety for his participation in a scheme by mayors to sue gun manufacturers.
Their focus seems to be to use “public nuisance” lawsuits to try and punish gun manufacturers for the actions of third parties.
Likely emboldened by the Remington lawsuit’s results, we’re going to see a lot more such lawsuits, but what they’re forgetting is that this wasn’t Remington who settled. This was an insurance company with no stake in the Second Amendment.
A lot of gun companies will fight such lawsuits and challenge these efforts right to the Supreme Court.
Do Bloomberg and company like their chances there?
If so, they’re more masochistic than I gave them credit for.
But until the Court smacks them down, they can do a lot of damage to the firearm industry. Pro-gun legislatures may want to look at how they may be able to curtail such actions by the anti-Second Amendment mayors marching to Bloomberg’s tune. Otherwise, the damage could become incalculable over the long term.
See, the purpose of the lawsuits isn’t to get restitution for some wrong. It’s extortion. The Bloomberg Bunch are basically saying, “You do things our way or we sue you into oblivion.”
After all, Michael Bloomberg has deep pockets, no heirs to worry about, so he can throw his billions at little more than just this. That’s something most gun manufacturers can’t afford to deal with.
And that’s the point.
They’re threatening these companies to either comply or die. If I did that to you, it’s basically extortion and I’d be thrown in prison for it, as I should be.
Yet Bloomberg’s efforts are considered perfectly legal.
Which means we need to dig in and fight back. After all, if Bloomberg gets his way in this, there won’t be any guns to buy, which essentially renders the Second Amendment irrelevant.
Are permits to purchase the next anti-gun domino to fall?
“May issue” concealed carry laws are out, thanks to the Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, but they’re not the laws that are likely to be implicated by the Court’s opinion. We’ve already seen SCOTUS vacate lower court decisions upholding bans on so-called assault weapons and “large capacity” magazines, and Bruen has been referenced in new challenges to the “sensitive places” and “good moral character” or “suitability” concealed carry restrictions slapped on the books in blue states like California, New York, and New Jersey in recent weeks as well.
The pro-gun control website The Trace reports that anti-gun activists are also worried that another subjective and arbitrary gun control law on the books in a handful of states is also in danger thanks to the Bruen decision: permits to purchase a firearm.
Of the 14 states that have such a policy, three — Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York — are may-issue, giving authorities the discretion to deny applicants a license in the interest of public safety, again based on criteria beyond basic requirements. Such criteria includes arrests that don’t result in convictions and other documented instances of violent behavior, including domestic violence. Now that the court has struck down may-issue for concealed carry, these last vestiges of the policy may be ripe for a court challenge as well, legal experts say.
“I wouldn’t be surprised, given the similarity,” said Alexander McCourt, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health. In many permit-to-purchase states, the handgun purchasing permit and concealed carry permit processes are one and the same, involving some of the same paperwork and evaluated by the same issuing authority, McCourt said. Several permit-to-purchase states also require handgun safety training, fingerprints, photographs, proof of residence, and waiting periods to own or buy a gun, just as they do for concealed carry permits. “There’s just a lot of parallels,” he said.
Issuing authorities in some of the permit-to-purchase states without may-issue still wield the discretion to deny permits, in the form of suitability and character requirements. In North Carolina, where purchase permits are required for handguns only, some sheriffs require applicants to be of “good moral character.” It’s unclear exactly how issuing authorities determine this, but it’s not “arbitrary discretion,” McCourt said. “They have to at least articulate a reason that could then be appealed and challenged.” McCourt expects suitability and character requirements to be challenged in court, as well.
As well they should. As The Trace acknowledges (somewhat surprisingly, I have to say), the only real historical analogues to the current permit to purchase laws are some 19th Century statutes that were put in place specifically to prevent black Americans from exercising their right to keep and bear arms.
Leftist Attacks on Law and Order are Precipitating a Shift in Favor of the Right to Self-Defense
On the morning of July 19, news broke that Manhattan District Attorney (DA) Alvin Bragg dropped a second-degree murder charge against 61-year-old, bodega clerk, Jose Alba. Earlier in the month, Alba had been arrested in Manhattan and charged with murder after defending himself from 35-year-old Austin Simon’s attack.
Alba’s saga is just one of many instances sending the same message. It is one that Soros-backed prosecutors and the left have been pushing for years: you do not have the right to defend yourself, ever.
Video surveillance would show Simon’s girlfriend berating Alba after her government issued food-stamp debit card was declined. Only moments later, Simon entered the store, walked behind the counter and shoved Alba against the wall. Simon then stood over Alba and blocked his exit.
When Alba attempted to get up, Simon grabbed him by the neck. That’s when Alba reached for a knife and stabbed Simon during the brawl that ensued. Simon died.
Alba’s bail was originally set at $250K, an outlandish number considering DA Bragg is an advocate for ending the cash bail system. In a move paralleling Bragg’s distaste for self-defense, ‘GoFundMe’ removed Alba’s page after people began donating to him.
After his arrest, it was revealed that Simon’s girlfriend pulled out her own knife and reportedly stabbed Alba during the brawl. At the time officers chose not to arrest her explaining that she was simply defending her boyfriend.
So, in the city of Manhattan you encourage your boyfriend to assault the man who refuses to let you steal from him and you have the legal license to stab him when he fights back.
Thankfully, the charges were dropped. But why were they filed to begin with? And why hasn’t the DA instructed his deputies to avoid charging victims and instead stay focused on the myriad number of violent criminals?
Alba’s mistreatment is the natural outworking of the Soros-backed prosecutors’ efforts to protect the criminal at all costs.
Threaten? That would be the least of a bunglars worries with me.
83 Percent: OK to Threaten Intruder With Gun
If someone is breaking into your home or business, 83% of voters say that it is appropriate to protect yourself by threatening him with a gun. A Scott Rasmussen national survey found that just 8% think it is not appropriate, and 9% are not sure.
The survey also found that 79% of voters believe that self-defense is a legitimate purpose for owning a gun, 69% say that hunting is, and 26% say protection against the government. Just 9% say there is no legitimate purpose for owning a gun.
Methodology
The survey of 1,200 registered voters was conducted online by Scott Rasmussen on July 12-13, 2022. Fieldwork for the survey was conducted by RMG Research, Inc. Certain quotas were applied, and the sample was lightly weighted by geography, gender, age, race, education, internet usage, and political party to reasonably reflect the nation’s population of registered voters. Other variables were reviewed to ensure that the final sample is representative of that population.
Judge Napolitano’s basic sentiment is correct, he just gets some facts wrong.
Your Gun Is None of the Government’s Business
No sooner had the Supreme Court released its decision last month recognizing the personal right to carry a handgun outside the home than the big-government politicians began to resist the court’s holding. None was more anti-Constitution than New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who told the court that “New York is ready for you.”
I understand that politicians often say and do things that they inwardly know are unconstitutional or unlawful in order to please their political bases, but vaguely threatening the Supreme Court over a fundamental liberty is an offense to the Constitution.
Here is the backstory.
The folly of an ‘assault weapons’ ban
Congress is desperately trying to resurrect a carcass of the 1990s. Democrats want to bring back their so-called assault weapons ban but pack it with more added restrictions this go-around. In fact, U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop, R-9th District, had a revealing exchange with New York Congressman Jerry Nadler, where the latter admitted that the point of the bill is to ban a host of weapons in everyday use today.
The bill, expected to receive a floor vote in August, is about disarming Americans, classifying them more as serfs and not citizens. Regardless of some good intentions for public safety, it’s yet another piece of gun legislation that gives criminals and the government the upper hand over law-abiding citizens.
Even U.S. Senator John Cornyn, R-Texas, who gleefully spearheaded the most recent gun control compromise, denounced the bill. “So-called ‘assault rifles’ are semiautomatic firearms,” wrote Cornyn. “Firing mechanism essentially the same as a semiautomatic pistol and shotgun. They should be honest: Democrats want to disarm law-abiding citizens while doing little about crime and undermining the police.” Cornyn’s right. Simply banning weapons based primarily on aesthetic characteristics serves no useful purpose except to take guns away from the citizenry.
The 1994 ‘assault weapons’ promised a reduction in gun violence and crime. Yet, tough sentencing laws and pro-active policing brought down the crime rate. A 2004 U.S. Department of Justice report noted that renewing the ‘assault weapons’ ban makes little sense. According to the report, the magazine capacity limits and banning certain classes of semiautomatic weapons “is likely to be small at best, and perhaps too small for reliable measurement” to impact gun violence. The ban expired soon after the Department of Justice findings.
“HR 1808 represents the latest over-reach by congressional Democrats seeking to incrementally end the private ownership of firearms,” declares Grass Roots North Carolina President Paul Valone. “By using a draconian ‘one feature’ test rather than the ‘two feature’ test of the 1994 ban on semiautomatic firearms, it would ban something as simple as a Ruger .22 pistol if it happened to have a threaded barrel, which is commonly used for attaching a muzzle brake or other device. Equally egregious is its ban on magazines holding more than ten rounds, severely limiting the ability of lawful citizens to use firearms for self-defense precisely when Democrat policies are causing an explosion of urban homicide.”
The ‘one feature’ test simply means that if a particular firearm has a single feature like a barrel shroud or telescoping stocks, it will fall under the ban. Valone and others believe that even if passed into law, the Supreme Court will probably strike it down as unconstitutional, particularly given the recent Bruen decision.
Still, the Constitution continues to prove to be meaningless in the minds of the aggressive gun-grabbing crowd. President Biden himself mindlessly reads from the teleprompter, “You can’t be on the side of the police” if you oppose this bill. Yet, a new Quinnipiac Poll, even with relentless media cheerleading for gun control, reveals that 49% of Americans support an ‘assault weapons’ ban. The bill has morphed into a behemoth for banning tens of millions of guns that already exist for the sake of rewarding anti-Second Amendment donors who lavishly spend to elect Democrats intent on seizing firearms.
It’s time to focus less on running afoul of inherent rights and banning legal weapons and instead look to practical solutions to crime and gun violence. The overwhelming majority of gun crimes are committed with handguns by criminals who already possess them illegally. Cities with the highest crime rates are usually the hardest places to buy guns in America. We should reject further proposals that narrowly focus on criminalizing law-abiding citizens for the illusion of safety.
The Americans legally accessing firearms remind us that the American Founders got it right the first time with our Second Amendment. People want to protect themselves from criminals and even the government if it becomes tyrannical. This protection was included in our Bill of Rights for the simple reason that it’s a right that predates American constitutional theory itself.
Democrats shocked… Shocked! To learn that gun companies charge money for firearms
Today the House Committee on Oversight and Reform held the first in a series of hearings designed to support efforts to enact new gun control laws. Invited to testify at the hearing were the CEOs of a number of prominent firearms manufacturing companies, including Daniel Defense, Smith & Wesson, Sig Sauer and others.
If you find yourself wondering what these CEOs have to do with this ongoing process, you’re not alone, but most of them agreed to show up. Ahead of the hearing, the committee released a lengthy statement penned by Democratic Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney. In it, she indicated that they would be releasing their findings from an “investigation” into the sales reports of the various companies as if it was really all that difficult to find their sales records.
Maloney announced what she clearly seemed to think was a shocking statistic. The combined companies racked up more than one billion dollars in sales of certain styles of semiautomatic long rifles that Democrats refer to as “assault weapons.” Oh, and they advertise their products. You’re shocked, I know. Here are a couple of excerpts from Maloney’s letter.
“How much are the lives of America’s children, teachers, parents, and families worth to gun manufacturers? My Committee’s investigation has revealed that the country’s major gun manufacturers have collected more than $1 billion in revenue from selling military-style assault weapons to civilians.
These companies are selling the weapon of choice for mass murderers who terrorize young children at school, hunt down worshippers at churches and synagogues, and slaughter families on the Fourth of July. In short, the gun industry is profiting off the blood of innocent Americans.
“My Committee has found that the business practices of these gun manufacturers are deeply disturbing, exploitative, and reckless. These companies use aggressive marketing tactics to target young people—especially young men—and some even evoke symbols of white supremacy. Yet we found that none of these companies bothers to keep track of the death and destruction caused by their products.
Maloney is obviously just trying to gin up anger against the firearms industry in hopes of forcing a vote on more gun control legislation. But let’s take a moment and look at the three major complaints she raises in the letter. One can only hope that she doesn’t come across this article and read it because I would hate to see her become even more traumatized than she clearly already is.
First, she notes that the various firearms companies have “collected” more than one billion dollars selling these rifles. (I love the use of the word “collected” to create some sort of sinister connotation.) To her credit, Maloney is absolutely correct. These companies do charge money for their products. The reason they “collect” so much for these various “Bushmaster” style rifles is that they are some of the most popular models in the country. But while the mass shootings draw a lot of media attention, it’s also worthwhile to point out to the congresswoman that the FBI has told us year after year after year that long rifles of any type are the least common type of firearms used in the commission of crimes, including murder. More people are killed on average every year by murderers using blunt objects, knives, or even their bare hands. Moving on.
She complains about the advertising themes that the firearms manufacturers employ when trying to boost sales. Again, she is correct. These companies produce advertisements to attract customers. In not one single ad we’ve ever seen have any of them suggested that these products should be used to kill human beings, though it’s clear that such a thing might happen if you are forced to defend yourself and/or your family from a home intruder. They are most commonly used for hunting or target shooting. This is another nonsensical “accusation.”
Her final complaint is that none of the gun companies are “bothering” to keep track of the number of people killed by people using these products. Really? How shocking. You’re telling us that civilian manufacturers of firearms are not in the business of collecting crime data from law enforcement agencies? Of course, if they did “bother” to do that, assuming they could legally extract the information from law enforcement agencies all around the country, they would discover that the number is minuscule compared to deaths caused by handguns, knives, and baseball bats, as I mentioned above. Perhaps they should start including that data in their advertising.
It’s kind of admirable that these CEOs were willing to travel to Washington and sit through all of this nonsense with a straight face. The Democrats in Congress are once again putting on yet another circus to try to distract the country from the disastrous state of the country at the moment and the failures of their own policies. But it’s a midterm election year so we probably should have expected this.
When the congresscritterz return from their august vacay, they’ll be at the start of campaign season where their interests will be in not doing controversial things that might have a negative effect on their re-election campaigns. Don’t hold your breath, but I think Peelousy and her demoncrap lackeys have missed the window to get this to a vote.
House Democrats give up on passing “assault weapons” ban… at least for now
In an embarrassing defeat for the gun control lobby, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has pulled the plug on the attempt to pass an “assault weapons” ban ahead of the August recess after failing to come up with the necessary votes, though POLITICO reports Democrats could try to revive the bill once lawmakers return after Labor Day.
According to the POLITICO report infighting between the Democrats’ progressive and “moderate” caucus led to the bill being pulled; not necessarily because of the gun ban itself, but because of progressives’ balking at a bill that would have increased funding for law enforcement.
Pelosi confirmed those plans to reporters Wednesday, acknowledging that the caucus has always planned to return when, or if, the Senate is able to complete work on a sweeping prescription drug and health care funding package: “The recognition that we have to come back … has made our plans a little bit different.”
The package of bills was intended to satisfy moderates — with measures to invest in local policing — as well as progressives, with the first vote to ban semi-automatic weapons since 1994. But other factions in the caucus, including the CBC, said they were skeptical of the timing of the policing legislation with only months remaining until the midterms. Progressives, too, demanded more safeguards placed on the grants to law enforcement organizations.
“We have a broad-based caucus that has multiple interests,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said as he left a closed-door meeting Wednesday morning. “The overwhelming majority want to make sure that people understand we want safe communities.”
Instead, the House will pivot its attention to a “big cat” public safety bill, a “Tiger King”-inspired bill from activist Carole Baskin, along with other noncontroversial legislation. Those will be the last votes for at least a week, as the House heads on its August recess and awaits Senate action on the drug pricing and health care bill.
Pelosi was hoping that “moderates” would support the gun ban bill while the progressive wing would bite their tongue and vote for the bill that would give more money to local law enforcement, but instead it sounds like the progressives weren’t willing to go along, which led to at least even more moderates balking at voting to ban the most commonly-sold rifles in the country. What remains unclear, for the moment anyway, is whether Democrats ever had the votes for their gun ban. I’m not convinced that’s the case even though Democrats are spinning the sidelining of the bill as an intra-party disagreement over policing.
Moderate Democrats have pushed for months for floor votes to show their commitment to supporting local police, after a scourge of GOP attack ads last cycle portrayed their party as anti-cop and soft on crime. Those attacks, according to Democrats’ own campaign arm, were “alarmingly potent” in key swing districts, and many battleground members believe it cost the party seats in the last election — which narrowed their House majority as they expected to expand it.
As the package of bills moved closer to the floor, however, progressives and Black Democrats raised alarm bells that the party shouldn’t be supporting more cash and support for policing programs without any kind of new accountability standards. The debate became highly nuanced: A bipartisan bill to increase the hiring and pay of police officers, particularly in local areas, became a bigger conversation about the role of policing.
“The debate is not about the function of policing. It’s about the definition of policing. And I think that that’s been the hard part,” said Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), a senior progressive.
I’m sure that there are a number of Democrats in purple districts who are breathing a sigh of relief that they don’t have to cast a vote on criminalizing the sale and purchase of most semi-automatic rifles as well as many models of shotguns and handguns, and I would be surprised if Nancy Pelosi really does decide to revisit the issue after Democrats return to D.C. after their August recess. It’s possible, of course, but if that’s going to happen she’s gonna have to convince the sizable number of progressives in the House to vote to increase funding for police and persuade the much smaller number of moderates to cast a high profile vote in favor of a sweeping gun ban just weeks before Americans start casting their votes in the midterms. If Pelosi couldn’t get that done in late July, I don’t see how it’s going to be any easier even closer to Election Day.
House Democrats target firearms industry in Oversight hearing
Democrats are once again making gun control their topic of the day in the House of Representatives today. Not only is Rep. David Cicillini’s bill to ban so-called assault weapons scheduled for a vote in the House Rules Committee (along with legislation that would repeal the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act), the House Oversight Committee is holding a hearing on “gun violence”, with a focus on how the firearms industry markets its products.
The hearing, which kicks off at 10 a.m. ET will feature the CEOs of several major gun manufacturers, as well as the anti-gun grandstanding from politicians like Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York, who chairs the committee.
“With more than 300 mass shootings in the United States so far this year, and gun violence now the leading cause of death of children in America, it is clear that we are in a public health epidemic,” said Chairwoman Maloney. “Our hearing will examine the role of gun manufacturers in flooding our communities with weapons of war and fueling America’s gun violence crisis. It is long past time for the gun industry to be held accountable for the carnage they enable and profit from.”
Perhaps not coincidentally, Maloney and Rep. Jerry Nadler (who chairs the Judiciary Committee that approved the “assault weapons” ban bill last week) are fighting for the same congressional seat thanks to New York’s redistricting map. Now the two Democrats can each boast of going after gun makers while they’re campaigning in the deep blue environs of NY-12.
As Maloney’s diatribe indicates, Democrats on the Oversight Committee will be trying to advance the narrative that the firearms industry has intentionally fueled violence through its marketing and advertising. We’ve seen some of their allies set the scene for today’s hearing, including former Kimber executive-turned-gun control activist Ryan Busse, who recently penned a piece at the Atlantic claiming that up until the mid 2000s, the firearms industry’s marketing was fine and dandy, but after the expiration of the AWB of 1994, the industry nefariously pivoted towards a more tactical mindset instead of its traditional focus on hunting and self-defense.
By 2016, Daniel Defense marketing was working so well that it won a coveted spot on the cover of Popular Mechanics magazine. The company’s press release proclaimed that the placement of its rifle in the “Tough Guys” issue was a “major accomplishment” because it would help Daniel Defense reach a “more mainstream audience.”
Like many other firearms companies, Daniel Defense also sought placement of its products in movies and video games. This Facebook post from 2019 alerts followers to the appearance of one of its DDM4 V7 rifles in the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare game. The DDM4 V7 was used by the 18-year-old gamer turned shooter in Uvalde, Texas.
Yeah, this is the kind of “evidence” that will be offered up at today’s show hearing to try to prove that the firearms industry is intentionally targeting cowardly killers like the 18-year old in Uvalde.
Marty Daniels of Daniel Defense is one of the CEOs invited to testify at the Oversight hearing, along with Smith & Wesson’s Mark Smith and Ruger’s Christopher Killoy. Busse himself will also be testifying at the hearing at the invitation of Democrats on the panel, along with Gun Owners of America’s Antonia Okafor and Kelly Sampson of the gun control group Brady. We’ll have more updates on the hearing later today, but I’m not expecting much to come out of this other than anti-gun Democrats like Maloney preening for the cameras and scapegoating the firearms industry for the actions of criminals and deranged killers.
‘Many, many’ Texas teachers seek to carry guns in schools, Tarrant County sheriff says
Many Texas teachers are becoming qualified to carry firearms in schools in the wake of the Uvalde mass shooting, according to Tarrant County Sheriff Bill Waybourn. Waybourn was part of a panel of politicians on Tuesday who spoke at an America First Policy Institute summit in Washington, D.C.
He joined Congressman Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, and Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt during a panel called, “Provide Safe and Secure Communities So All Americans Can Live Their Lives in Peace.” Pam Bondi and Matthew Whitaker led the session.
Donald Trump was scheduled to speak at the summit Tuesday afternoon. Bondi asked the panelists about various topics on policing and crime in the U.S.. She asked Waybourn what he thought needed to be done in schools in the wake of the deadly shooting in Uvalde. Waybourn apologized on behalf of Texas for the “epic failure of law enforcement in Uvalde.”
Waybourn said schools must be “hardened” to protect kids from shooters, mirroring Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s call for action to better secure schools from potential shooters. To protect schools, Waybourn said, schools need “a good guy with a gun ready to go,” whether that person is a police officer or a “well-trained vetted staff member in that school.”
“And in Texas, many, many teachers are out qualifying today as we speak,” Waybourn said. “And they’re getting ready to go.” The Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to questions about where Waybourn received his information on teachers increasingly becoming qualified to carry guns in school. In Texas, school staff can carry firearms in schools as part of the School Marshal program. Through the program, a school district applies for qualification and, if accepted, sends their selected candidate to an 80-hour training course.
Across the state, 62 school districts were qualified through the program for a total of 256 school marshals as of May, Texas Commission on Law Enforcement spokeswoman Gretchen Grigsby told the Dallas Morning News. The names of the districts and marshals are confidential. Transfer of Power A special newsletter from our D.C. Bureau focused on transition to the Biden administration.
Texas has more than 1,200 school districts, including charter schools. Texas also allows staff to carry guns on campus through the Guardian Plan. Under the authority of the federal Gun-Free School Zones Act and the Texas Penal Code, school districts can grant written permission for designated employees to carry firearms on campus.
Texas politicians, such as Attorney General Ken Paxton, have urged schools to arm teachers in the wake of the Uvalde shooting, in which a gunman killed 19 students and two teachers in May. Other school districts, including the Fort Worth school district, want politicians to focus on gun laws. On July 12, the Fort Worth school board asked Abbott to call for a special legislative session to pass “common sense” gun law policies to protect students from mass shootings. The America First Policy Institute is a nonprofit organization focused on a policy agenda for Republican leaders.
Yep, it’s true! They’re coming for your guns.
Democrat Rep. David N “Spare Me The B——- about Constitutional Rights” Cicilline and others have said the quiet part out loud: they want to ban almost all semi-automatic weapons in common use.
If you wondered why the nation’s socialist news cabal American Pravda suddenly decided to drop the terms “assault weapon” and “assault rifle” from their propaganda lexicon, your answer was soon forthcoming in their triumphant announcement of their next onslaught against your sensible civil rights: “Democrats push for 1st semi-automatic gun ban in 20 years.”
In a tyrannical two-for-one special, not only have the enemies of liberty of the fascist far left admitted that the whole point of this was to ban weapons in common use, but they’re also tacitly defying the United States Supreme Court ruling District of Columbia v. Heller.
This video from pro-freedom patriot Colion Noir gives a good rundown on the facts in this case.
Most damning is this exchange between Dan Bishop (R) and chairman of the Judiciary Committee Jerry Nadler (D) in a congressional committee meeting during the markup of the bill on July 20, 2022:
Bishop: Is there anyone on the other side that would dispute that this bill would ban weapons that are in common use in the United States today?
Nadler: Yeah, that’s the point of the bill.
Bishop: To clarify, Mr. Chairman, you’re saying it is the point of the bill to ban weapons that are in common use in the United States today?
Nadler: Yes, the problem is they are in common use
If we’ve heard it once, we’ve heard a thousand times: all they want is “commonsense,” “sensible,” or “reasonable” gun control. Except they never define those terms — on purpose.
Well, now we know what they mean. They want to ban almost everything aside from a few “manually operated” firearms.
The most important section of the bill is section 2, the “Definitions,” which sets out the scope of what the bill covers. After wading through the text that modifies the relevant federal code, we get to this part:
Mississippi board of education votes to let schools set their own gun policies
The move by the state board of education isn’t likely to lead to armed staff members protecting kids in Mississippi’s few Democratic bastions like Jackson, but now that the board has said individual school districts can set their own policies when it comes to guns on campus many smaller and more rural schools may very well decide that having a few trained and vetted volunteer staffers carrying to protect the students in their care is a good idea.
Late last week the state board of education updated a 1990 policy that barred anyone other than law enforcement from carrying on school grounds, arguing that the old policy conflicts with the state’s “enhanced concealed carry” law. That law specifically allows those with the enhanced carry license to lawfully carry in some “sensitive places” deemed off-limits to those carrying with a regular license or under the state’s Constitutional Carry law, and as of now the board says that districts can choose to permit or forbid employees with enhanced permits from carrying on school grounds.
At the boarding meeting, Erin Meyer, the education department’s general counsel, said state law provides “local school districts with the authority and discretion to determine” its weapons policies. School districts can decide for themselves whether or not employees who hold enhanced carry licenses can bring guns onto school property.
School districts must also adopt policies that apply to non-employees. A 2013 state attorney general’s opinion argued teachers or administrators can refuse to meet with armed people in a “non-public” school area. Mississippi K-12 schools are closed to the public, but a school concert, play or sporting event is open to the public, Cook said.
Patricia Ice, a volunteer with the Mississippi chapter of Moms Demand Action, a gun reform organization, urged school districts to adopt policies that limit firearms on campus.
“Allowing teachers and members of the public to carry guns in our K-12 schools is a dangerous idea that will further jeopardize the safety of students and staff alike,” Ice said. “We need the adults in the room to make evidence-based policy decisions that will actually keep our children safe, rather than making decisions that will put more guns in their classrooms and put our kids at risk.”
Ice can’t point to any issue in states where teachers and staff are authorized to legally carry a firearm on campus as a deterrent to a targeted attack against students, but Moms Demand Action has long opposed the idea anyway. In fact, Moms Demand Action and their parent group Everytown for Gun Safety helped sue to overturn Ohio’s armed school staff statutes, forcing lawmakers in the Buckeye State to craft new legislation this year ensuring that districts have the flexibility to adopt the practice if they choose.
Those eyes
You can’t be pro-insurrection and pro-cop.
You can’t be pro-insurrection and pro-democracy.
You can’t be pro-insurrection and pro-American.pic.twitter.com/DCHprpK9Sx— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) July 26, 2022
Are they taping them open?? Is it the Botox??
Is the dude amped up on Adderall???
Also, is he trying to turn cops against Americans for disagreeing with unconstitutional Democrat power grabs and calling it insurrection?
I don’t know… I can’t think about anything other than those eyes.
New Report ‘Crime in Washington 2021’ Damning Proof of Gun Control Failure
In the midst of a continuing pattern of rising crime in Washington State, a new report released by the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC) does two things, one of them completely unintentional.
The report says there were 325 murders last year in the state, “an increase of 5.9 percent since 2020.” It is the highest number of murders recorded since WASPC began collecting data in 1980.
What the data also demonstrates is that restrictive gun control initiatives pushed through by a billionaire-backed gun prohibition lobbying group based in Seattle have failed to make communities safer, essentially putting the lie to any promises or predictions made by their proponents.
Translation: Gun control advocates misled Evergreen State voters. Their forecasts and arguments were wrong, just as Northwest gun rights leaders said they would be.
According to the Crime in Washington 2021 report, “In 2021, Violent Crimes showed an increase of 12.3% with 29,238 offenses reported; compared to 26,036 offenses reported in 2020. There were 325 murders in 2021; this is an increase of 5.9% compared to 307 murders in 2020.”
That’s even more homicides than the annual FBI Uniform Crime Report listed for 2020, the most recent year for which FBI data is available. The Crime Report is released in late September each year. For 2020, the FBI listed 298 homicides, of which 177 were committed with firearms. That was up from the 209 murders, including 141 involving guns, posted in the 2015 Crime Report.
The new WASPC report “compiles data from 232 state, county, municipal and tribal agencies,” according to KOMO News. It “is designed to give residents information on what is happening in their communities. It covers a wide variety of crime, an issue people living in Seattle say is getting out of hand.”
The report came as news from neighboring Oregon confirmed Initiative Petition 17, which seeks to ban so-called “large capacity magazines” and require Oregonians to get a permit before they can purchase a firearm, has qualified to appear on the November ballot.
No rights are subject to the whims of a tyrannically minded majority. That’s why they’re called ‘rights‘ and not something else.
Are Constitutional Rights Subject to Poll Results?
A recent online survey conducted last month by the Oregon Values and Beliefs Center in Portland revealed “nearly 60% favored stricter federal gun regulations, and 56% said the same about the state’s regulations.”
That was from a response of more than 1,400 Beaver State adults, according to the Oregon Capital Chronicle. The story appeared as Portland-based anti-gunners were delivering petitions to the Secretary of
State in Salem to put a restrictive gun control measure on the November ballot that will ban original capacity magazines and require Oregonians to get a permit before they can legally purchase a firearm.
In neighboring Washington four years ago, a well-financed campaign by the billionaire-backed Alliance for Gun Responsibility pushed Initiative 1639 into law. That measure invented a definition of a so-called “semiautomatic assault rifle,” a gun which, according to Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich, doesn’t exist. The sweeping definition applies to every self-loading rifle ever manufactured anywhere, regardless of caliber.
These developments raise the question whether constitutional rights can be subject to popularity contests, which initiative elections actually are. That is, at least until they are challenged successfully in federal court.
House Democrats’ ‘Assault Weapons’ Ban Prohibits Semiautomatic Pistols Too
The “assault weapons” ban legislation that passed the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday not only prohibits AR-15s and AK-47s, but numerous semiautomatic pistols and shotguns as well.
The legislation, H.R. 1808, is sponsored by Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI).
On July 15, 2022, Breitbart News warned that H.R. 1808 bans the manufacture and sale of at least 45 specific AR-15 rifles , including, “Bushmaster ACR, Bushmaster Carbon 15, Bushmaster MOE series, Bushmaster XM15, Chiappa Firearms MFour rifles, Colt Match Target rifles, CORE Rifle Systems CORE15 rifles, Daniel Defense M4A1 rifles, Devil Dog Arms 15 Series rifles,” as well as the Diamondback DB15 rifles.
Moreover, it bans the manufacture and sale of all AR-pistols, and thirteen are specifically listed: “American Spirit AR–15 pistol, Bushmaster Carbon 15 pistol, Chiappa Firearms M4 Pistol GEN II, CORE Rifle Systems CORE15 Roscoe pistol, Daniel Defense MK18 pistol, DoubleStar Corporation AR pistol, DPMS AR–15 pistol, Jesse James Nomad AR–15 pistol, Olympic Arms AR–15 pistol, Osprey Armament MK–18 pistol, POF USA AR pistols, Rock River Arms LAR 15 pistol,” and the “Uselton Arms Air-Lite M–4 pistol.”
But the language of H.R. 1808 also makes clear the legislation bans numerous semiautomatic pistols as well.
The ban applies to semiautomatic pistols with detachable magazines and threaded barrels. Because of the popularity of suppressors for hearing protection, nearly every semiautomatic pistol manufacturer makes pistol models with threaded barrels. This means an untold number of semiautomatic pistols would be banned by H.R. 1808.
Also, any semiautomatic pistol with a fixed magazine capable of holding more than ten rounds would be banned, as would any semiautomatic shotgun with a fixed magazine holding more than five rounds.
H.R. 1808 also bans semiautomatic shotguns that accept detachable magazines and have a pistol grip.
