Category: RKBA

Justice Alito Grants Temporary Stay for ATF’s “Ghost Gun” Rule

U.S.A. — On July 27, 2023, the Attorney General of the Biden Administration, Merrick B. Garland, applied for a stay to Justice Alito at the Supreme Court in the case of VanDerStok v. Garland. The request for an emergency stay had been refused by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on July 24, 2023, as reported on AmmoLand.  One of the possibilities mentioned was the Biden administration would appeal directly to the Supreme Court. The possibility of a request for an en banc decision existed but was unlikely because the Fifth Circuit has been following the Supreme Court guidance in the Bruen decision for enforcing Second Amendment rights and because an en banc panel would not have been emplaced for a period of time.

The district court’s universal vacatur is irreparably harming the public and the government by reopening the floodgates to the tide of untraceable ghost guns flowing into our Nation’s communities.

You are correct if this sounds like the familiar song and dance put forward by dictators and authoritarians worldwide.

Update: Justice Alito grants administrative stay for a week. Responses are due on August 2, 2023.

Alito Grants Temporary Stay for ATF’s “Ghost Gun” Rule by AmmoLand Shooting Sports News on Scribd

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Why Aren’t Female Victims of Domestic Violence Told the Best Way to Protect Themselves?

On Monday, July 17th, Lance Logan brutally murdered 64-year-old Carolyn Williams in her Hartford, Connecticut, home while she was on the telephone with a 9-1-1 operator. He also beat her 30-year-old son.

“He hit me again . . . . Stop it, stop, it, he has a weapon,” she told the 9-1-1 operator immediately before being murdered. Logan had prior convictions for domestic violence and a number of other felonies. Among his previous convictions was a 2016 domestic assault for which he faced a 5-year suspended sentence and 3-years probation, so he served no prison time.

Logan now faces charges of murder, assault in the second degree, and violation of a protective order. It was illegal for him to own guns, but he still obtained two firearms – a sawed-off shotgun and a pistol.

The case clearly illustrates the limits of protective orders when someone is intent on murdering the victim. If the murderer is willing to risk a life sentence for murder, an additional five years in prison and a $5,000 fine won’t deter him.

It is an important problem. Reportedly, 76% of women murdered by someone who had been an intimate partner were stalked.

Violence prevention advocates recommend a long list of safety precautions. These changes require women to uproot their lives.

Among the advice: women should change jobs, travel routes, the time of day they leave home or work, move in with a friend or family, change the locks on their home, or do their shopping and other chores with friends or relatives.

A few recommend that women practice martial arts such as judo, jiu-jitsu, karate, or boxing.

But the most obvious answer is missing from these lists: women should get a concealed handgun permit and a firearm.

As a victim of domestic violence who has suffered some broken teeth, fractured bones, and other permanent physical injuries, I am acutely aware of how important it is to protect victims.

Men are typically much stronger than women, particularly in upper body strength. Unfortunately, real life isn’t like the movies, where one woman can knock out and overpower several well-trained men. Even well-trained women often struggle to defend themselves against much larger and stronger men. Men also tend to be faster runners.

A firearm represents a much bigger change in a woman’s ability to defend herself. Men can readily hurt women without a gun, and if a woman is already in physical contact with the attacker so that he can take away their gun, they are already in trouble.

The peer-reviewed research shows that murder rates decline when people carry concealed handguns, whether men or women. But a woman carrying a concealed handgun reduces the murder rate for women by about 3 to 4 times more than a man doing the same.

And this message is getting across to women. Between 2012 and 2022, in states that provide data by sex, concealed handgun permits increased 115% more quickly among women than among men. The percentage of women who say that gun ownership protects people from crime has also been growing faster. But while they are growing at a faster rate, women still only make up about 30 percent of permit holders.

Many states could make it much easier for stalked women to defend themselves. Even after taking the required training and applying for a permit, it can often take two to three months for a permit to be issued.

But even one month may be much too long for a threatened woman. Even women who have proven to a court that they face serious threats must wait to get a permit. One solution would be to allow women with court orders of protection to carry a concealed handgun while waiting for a permit to be issued.

Many single women with children may also find it difficult to pay fees for a permit, plus additional fees for fingerprinting and training. While there are now 27 Constitutional Carry states that don’t require people pay fees or waiting periods to be able to carry a gun, other states such as California can run $250 to $250 for five years, Illinois $150, and New York City $566.70. Training can easily add hundreds more.

Police are very important, but they almost always arrive after the crime occurs. Protective orders can help. But if we are going to be serious about protecting women like Carolyn Williams, we must let them protect themselves.

Comment O’ The Day

I don’t trust information about studies unless a link is given to read the study or a title of the study is given so that it can be found. Behind this study is Cynthia Miller-Idriss. She’s the same person who claims “Physical fitness has always been central to the far right.”

Everytown

Our new study with @splcenter found that young people with easier access to guns tended to hold stronger beliefs that the government is restricting our freedoms and that the Second Amendment gives citizens the right to overthrow the government.

Moros Kostas

You guys are really telling on yourselves with this one. Gun rights bother you at least in part because they promote small government views.

Government, almost by definition, DOES restrict our freedoms. Those polled aren’t wrong in the least for seeing it that way. The constant struggle is keeping this necessary evil contained to the minimum required for a functioning society.

Orgs like Everytown are part of a broad spectrum of authoritarian social engineers. They want people to be docile, preferably stuffed into cities, owning nothing, and restricted to a narrow overton window of acceptable opinions and lifestyles. The Chinese social credit system is their model.

Guns are a threat to this (as is free speech, which is why that is also a target for them). Not even really guns themselves, but the individualist ideas they can awaken simply by accepting the natural right to bear arms. Because once you accept the natural rights framework, the Bloombergian government dystopia they want is unacceptable.

Notice how the very same people who want to ban guns also tend to want social media to censor more speech, want the government to tax everything they declare undesirable, want to punish thought crimes with a widening net of “hate speech” restrictions that shutter the overton window, and constantly find new things they want banned.

This is also why they insist on federal gun laws. They know Boise or Manchester are doing just fine with minimal gun control laws, which drives them insane. It proves the problem in their violent cities is their own fault, and not due to gun rights. The authoritarians can’t allow such counterexamples to exist.

Control, control, control. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.

Also, if people polled really said the 2A grants the right to overthrow govt, that’s nonsense. But I wonder if what they meant (these are young laypeople, after all) was that the 2A exists in part as a failsafe against a govt that has gone tyrannical. Because that is absolutely correct.

 

Worth repeating….

“30-40%” who are willing to tell a stranger over the phone that they have guns” just doesn’t punch quite right as a headline.

Boom: Up to 60% of Americans could own guns, twice estimate

A surge in “quiet gun owners,” much like the so-called “silent majority” in political circles, is leading firearms analysts to believe that far more Americans own weapons than the accepted 30% cited in polls.

At the highest end, it’s possible that up to 60% of Americans own guns, especially with the pandemic-era rise in gun buying among women and minorities, especially in suburban and urban areas.

At the lowest end, it’s likely that at least 40% of Americans own guns, according to a groundbreaking study of those who lie to pollsters about firearms.

The study from Rutgers University’s New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center is spreading like wildfire in the industry, which for years has tried to accurately estimate United States gun ownership and determine why polls show support for gun control, but then there is little follow through when legislation is proposed.

Reason Magazine’s J.D. Tuccille put part of the study in the spotlight in an early July post that began the buzz in the gun industry about the potential of far higher U.S. gun ownership.

He highlighted the study’s conclusion that nearly a third of those polled might be lying when they deny having a firearm.

 

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Nipping gun ownership in the bud: Dept of Education’s outrageous moves

It is the job of the Congress to write airtight, unambiguous legislation that allows no opportunity for Executive or Judicial mischief. That’s a tough task to begin with, but an overambitious Executive or Judicial branch can stretch and mangle those words beyond ridicule to do whatever they want. It doesn’t help that the job keeps getting harder with time as long-agreed upon words are intentionally rejiggered to lose their meaning.

The latest example of Executive Overreach is the “reimagining” of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA), a gun control law that was passed by government to compensate for the failure of government and placate the insatiable appetites of abusive gun controllers. Fox News reports (archived links):

Biden admin withholding key funding for schools with hunting, archery programs

EXCLUSIVE: The Biden administration is blocking key federal funding earmarked under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of 1965 for schools with hunting and archery programs.

According to federal guidance circulated among hunting education groups and shared with Fox News Digital, the Department of Education determined that, under the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA) passed last year, school hunting and archery classes are precluded from receiving federal funding. The interpretation could impact millions of American children enrolled in such programs.

“It’s a negative for children. As a former educator of 30-plus years, I was always trying to find a way to engage students,” Tommy Floyd, the president of the National Archery in the Schools Program, told Fox News Digital in an interview. “In many communities, it’s a shooting sport, and the skills from shooting sports, that help young people grow to be responsible adults. They also benefit from relationships with role models.”[…]

According to Floyd, his organization boasts 1.3 million students from nearly 9,000 schools across 49 states who are enrolled in archery courses. Some of those schools have already canceled plans to include archery or hunting education courses in their curriculum due to the Education Department guidance.

Why oh why would the Federal Department of Education target hunting and archery in schools? It’s perhaps a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a puzzle to some, but it’s obvious to me that the DoE is trying to nip gun ownership in the bud by choking off exposure and interest in the next generation. Gun controllers are playing a long game, and this is a move to advance their disarmament agenda.

The legislation included an amendment to an ESEA subsection listing prohibited uses for federal school funding. That amendment prohibits ESEA funds from helping provide any person with a dangerous weapon or to provide “training in the use of a dangerous weapon.”

I looked up the text of the law and this is what it says:

Subtitle D–Amendment on ESEA Funding

SEC. 13401. AMENDMENT ON ESEA FUNDING.
Section 8526 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965

(20 U.S.C. 7906) is amended–
(1) in paragraph (5), by striking “or” after the
semicolon;
(2) in paragraph (6), by striking the period at the end and</sp
inserting “; or”; and
(3) by adding at the end the following:
“(7) for the provision to any person of a dangerous weapon,
 as defined in section 930(g)(2) of title 18, United States Code, 
 or training in the use of a dangerous weapon.”.

I can see how this amendment could be stretched to construe the prohibition of funding for archery and hunting programs.

However, in a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona earlier this month, Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Thom Tillis, R-N.C., expressed concern that the agency is misinterpreting the provision which they said was included in the BSCA last year to withhold education funds for programs training school resource officers, not for hunting and archery classes. School resource officer training was funded under a separate provision.

“We were alarmed to learn recently that the Department of Education has misinterpreted the BCSA to require the defending of certain longstanding educational and enrichment programs — specifically, archery and hunter education classes — for thousands of children, who rely on these programs to develop life skills, learn firearm safety and build self-esteem,” Cornyn and Tillis wrote to Cardona.

“The Department mistakenly believes that the BSCA precludes funding these enrichment programs,” they continued. “Such an interpretation contradicts congressional intent and the text of the BSCA.”

Senators Cornyn, Tillis, and every self-proclaimed Second Amendment supporting elected official have some serious explaining to do to their voters. This language slipped under the radar and is now rearing its head. Gun control-supporting apparatchiks at the DoE are taking advantage of it because the text did not explicitly state that such training programs are exempt.

Overall, the ESEA is the primary source of federal aid for elementary and secondary education across the country, according to the Congressional Research Service. The BSCA earmarked an additional $1 billion for educational activities under the ESEA.

Personally, I want to see a complete and permanent separation of School and State and the Department of Education eliminated. But that’s not happening anytime soon.

With so much money at stake, this was a legislative fumble to put it mildly. Let’s see what the Biden DoE does next.

“Why do you need AR-15s?”

Home invaders pretended to be Gwinnett police, tossed grenades into homes, police say

After a series of home invasions involving suspects impersonating police officers, Gwinnett County police arrested one of potentially several suspects connected to the crime spree.

Three families were victimized by multiple masked men armed with guns and body armor during home invasions in Lilburn and Norcross from June 9 to June 12, according to police. In the first case, the suspects threw a practice grenade through a window to enter the home and ransack the house.

“Whatever they were looking for,” the victim, who asked to remain anonymous, told Channel 2 Gwinnett County Bureau Chief Matt Johnson. “I hope they find prison time for their trouble.”

The victim shared a video of a man with a mask, a shotgun and body armor at his doorstep in Lilburn off Burns Road on June 9 just after 3:30 a.m. He said the man identified himself as police but threw the inert grenade through the window when the victim didn’t answer the door. From there, police say the suspect, working with others, stole electronics when they couldn’t find any money or drugs.

“They actually sprayed mace around the perimeter of the door and underneath it to try and get me out or prevent me from coming out,” said the victim.

On Tuesday, Gwinnett police arrested Jeron Hernandez-Massa, 23, and charged him with 10 felonies, including three counts of home invasion. However, investigators say he didn’t act alone.

At a home in Norcross, a pregnant mother and her family were held at gunpoint by Hernandez-Massa and as many as four other suspects claiming to be D.E.A. agents, according to police. There were 8-year-old, 4-year-old, and 10-year-old boys home at the time and police say Hernandez-Massa and the suspects threaten to harm the children if the family didn’t give them money and drugs.

“My stepdad is a construction worker,” said one of the family members held at gunpoint. “My mom was just a pregnant lady. They left with nothing, and they hurt us.”

The family says they told the robbers they had the wrong house and that there weren’t drugs or money around. It only made them more upset, they say.

“I ran into the garage and that’s when they hit me,” said the victim, adding she was left bruised from being pistol-whipped.

Police haven’t said how many more suspects they may be looking for or how they believe the homes were targeted. Hernandez-Massa remains in jail without bond.

The 38th Annual Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC 2023) will be held September 22nd – September 24th, 2023 in Phoenix, AZ.
This year’s theme is Road To Liberty!

The conference will be held at:
Marriott Phoenix Airport
1101 North 44th St
Phoenix, AZ 85008

You can book your hotel room with our exclusive low group-rate by following this link.

We will also be on multiple virtual platforms including YouTube and Facebook. 

 

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New Jersey Association seeks to sue Garden State over Mr. & Mrs. Smith-style training mandate

If you’re interested in participating in a challenging marksmanship program that’ll tax your tactical abilities, then we’ve got something for you. While you could go to one of the many top-of-the-line and state-of-the-art training destinations to challenge yourself and get in some time behind the trigger, don’t bother. The New Jersey State Police has chartered a program that’s for those seeking a real challenge.

Unfortunately, this challenge is not a joke, but it’s what the state has decided to implement as a training requirement to get a permit to carry. The Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs just asked to have their federal challenge to the law that put this training into effect reopened in the New Jersey Federal District Court because of the onerous mandate.

The newly rolled out training requirements in order to get a permit to carry seem like exactly what’s described above. An authoritative and challenging course of fire that an expert would be looking to use to cut their teeth further, is not what Mr. and Mrs. New Jersey should have to do in order to exercise a constitutional right. Rather than New Jersey be lock-step with the rest of the country that has reasonable training mandates, they’d prefer to force everyday people to be able to rise to a training standard that Mr. and Mrs. Smith would have to.

Sounds hyperbolic, but consider attorney Evan Nappen’s explanation of what the training requirement is for nearly all current and future permit to carry holders. Nappen refers to the training as “New Jersey’s ‘John Wick’ Carry Training Mandate.”

A new and much more difficult level of shooting proficiency is now required for citizens in New Jersey who wish a obtain a Permit to Carry a Handgun or continue to keep their Permit to Carry a Handgun.

The new requirements demand timed firing from concealed holsters. Kneeling position shooting and accurately shooting at 25 yards are also incorporated into the course. It is hard to envision citizen self-defense scenarios justifying the use of deadly force at 25 yards!

There are no exceptions for physically handicapped people. The new requirements are basically the same requirements utilized for retired police officers to get their New Jersey RPO handgun carry card. This means that any citizen who wishes to exercise their Second Amendment rights must now have the same skill level of proficiency as a veteran law enforcement officer who has trained and qualified with firearms for years!

If a person wants a Drivers License, should they be required to qualify as a NASCAR Racer before receiving it? Yet, driving is not a Constitutional right, but carrying a gun is one. Harsh requirements are not permitted for the exercise of Constitutional rights.

New Jersey is using a variation out of the racist playbook of Southern Democrats who tried to stop Blacks from voting by demanding poll taxes and literacy tests.

The anti-Constitutional rights NJ Democrats have done the same thing here for the exercise of Second Amendment rights by all citizens with the passage of the Murphy “Carry Killer” Anti-Civil Rights law.

Nappen points out something we’ve all been saying since last year, and that’s Governor Phil Murphy – as well as many other executives, lawmakers, and judges all over the blue states of the U.S.- have been approaching the NYSRPA v. Bruen decision in the same manner southern leaders treated Blacks during the antebellum Jim Crow period of our country and a post-Brown v. Board of Education United States.

The anti-civil liberty pinkos have jumped the shark when it comes to regulation, and the new training standard is a bridge too far. Consider footnote #9 from NYSRPA:

That said, because any permitting scheme can be put toward abusive ends, we do not rule out constitutional challenges to shall-issue regimes where, for example, lengthy wait times in processing license applications or exorbitant fees deny ordinary citizens their right to public carry.

The training would constitute an abusive end according to the opinion. Not only are the training requirements beyond what would be considered “designed to ensure only that those bearing arms in the jurisdiction are, in fact, ‘law-abiding, responsible citizens,’” not consistent with the footnote, as a sidebar, the newly instituted fees fit that bill as well.

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Chevron Deference Violates the Constitution, Argues FPC and FPCAF in Supreme Court Brief

Today, Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) and FPC Action Foundation (FPCAF) announced the filing of an important brief with the United States Supreme Court in the case of Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, in which FPC and FPCAF ask the Supreme Court to overrule the deference doctrine the Court established in Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. The brief can be viewed at FPCLegal.org.

Chevron deference, as it has come to be known, requires a court to defer to an executive branch agency’s interpretation of federal law, even if that interpretation is not the best interpretation of the law. This doctrine has allowed federal executive branch agencies, such as the ATF, to run wild, unchecked by either Congress or the courts. Ending Chevron deference will help ensure that courts can better check federal executive branch power.

“Chevron violates Article III by transferring from the judiciary to the executive the ultimate interpretative authority to say what the law is,” argues the brief. “It violates Article I by incentivizing Congress to abdicate its legislative duties and delegate legislative authority to the executive. As a result, Chevron accumulates legislative, executive, and judicial powers in a single branch of government—which the Founders considered the very definition of tyranny.”

“The Framers of our Constitution learned from thousands of years of human experience that governments with power concentrated in one body are unsustainable and often tyrannical,” said FPCAF’s Director of Constitutional Studies, Joseph Greenlee. “The Framers, therefore, separated the legislative, executive, and judicial functions in our Constitution to prevent tyranny and safeguard our liberties. Chevron deference undoes this deliberate design, paving the way for abusive governance. We’re hopeful that the Court will use this opportunity to overrule Chevron and restore the Founders’ design.”…

Florida judge tosses gun possession cases now that permitless carry is in effect

On July 1st, it became legal in Florida for lawful gun owners to carry a concealed firearm without the need for a government permission slip. While the start of permitless carry hasn’t led to the state devolving into the Wild West or an anarchic dystopia, it has left courts around the state wrestling with what to do about those individuals who were arrested and charged with carrying without a license before the new law took effect.

On Tuesday, an Orange County courtroom was the setting for both a judge and prosecutors to throw out more than a half-dozen cases, though not every defendant is in the clear.

In a rapid-fire hearing Tuesday, an Orange County judge dismissed five cases of people charged with illegally carrying a concealed firearm that began before Florida’s new permit-less carry law took effect, while prosecutors opted to drop charges against two others.

The seven total decisions were made in a nine-minute span, with prosecutors and defense attorneys mostly referring to written arguments and saying little out loud.

Judge Mark Blechman did not give a reasoning when announcing his decision, but the few questions he asked suggested he was following the guidelines set out by the new law.…

So far, attorneys said Orange County’s court system has acted similarly to a roulette wheel, with attorneys getting different outcomes in each court room they argue in.

“I have about five pending right now with motions in various divisions,” Kathleen Gillard, whose client was among Blechman’s dismissals, said. “One judge still has it under advisement. I had watched a hearing last week where another judge granted somebody’s motion.”

Many attorneys have not yet asked their judges to dismiss their cases. Attorney Roger Weeden speculated it was because they were waiting to see how the early rulings would go. It’s estimated that there are hundreds of charges pending in various stages of the court system in Orange and Osceola counties alone.

Weeden said he himself had a half dozen cases he was working to offload, and hoped Tuesday would begin a domino chain.

“The judges are all going to be mindful of what the other judges are doing,” he explained.

Though prosecutors dropped the charge of carrying without a permit in two cases, both defendants are still facing charges for more serious crimes, according to State Attorney Monique Worrell.

The action by Judge Blechman seems like the most appropriate course to take. If the actions of those defendants were against the law when they were arrested, but the law now allows them to legally carry, what benefit is served by bringing them to trial or even offering them a plea deal in exchange for admitting guilt? The criminal justice system in this country is plagued with inefficiency and an over-reliance on plea bargains as it is, and clogging up courtrooms with non-violent, possessory carry cases that are no longer a crime is a terrible use of taxpayer dollars and the finite resources of prosecutors, public defenders, and the judiciary, not to mention a nightmare when it comes to protecting civil rights.

It’s unclear how many of the “hundreds” of outstanding cases around the state are purely possessory in nature, but there’s no reason why judges and/or prosecutors can’t dismiss the charges of carrying without a license while keeping any underlying charges in place. Florida’s criminal justice system, like its legislature, should be focused on delivering consequences for crimes of violence, not fueling infringements on our fundamental right to bear arms that have since been wiped off the books.

St. Louis and D.C. Show Gun Control Isn’t About Public Safety

With many prominent government officials exhibiting a flagrant indifference to violent crime, it’s getting harder for anti-gun politicians to pretend that their gun control schemes are anything other than a means to harass law-abiding gun owners. Recent incidents from anti-gun jurisdictions St. Louis and the District of Columbia further illustrate this point.

According to the station, Jones texted her father, “Chicago has strict gun laws as well but that doesn’t deter gun violence.” Jones put more faith in social programs, texting, “It’s about investing in the people.”

These once-private comments are a stark contrast to Jones’ public statements and actions. Jones is a co-chair of billionaire Michael Bloomberg front-group Mayor’s Against Illegal Guns (MAIG). MAIG, along with Moms Demand Action, are part of the Bloomberg gun control conglomerate Everytown for Gun Safety.

The mayor also supported a “federal Red Flag law.” As enacted, red flag laws empower the government to confiscate a law-abiding person’s firearms without due process.

As NRA-ILA has repeatedly pointed out, despite having some of the strictest gun laws in the nation, the District of Columbia has exhibited little interest in prosecuting those who misuse firearms.

A December 2021 study from the federal enclave’s Criminal Justice Coordinating Council and the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) found that “In Washington, DC, most gun violence is tightly concentrated.” The report went on to explain,

This small number of very high risk individuals are identifiable, their violence is predictable, and therefore it is preventable. Based on the assessment of data and the series of interviews conducted, [National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform] estimates that within a year, there are at least 500 identifiable people who rise to this level of very high risk, and likely no more than 200 at any one given time. These individuals comprise approximately 60-70% of all gun violence in the District.

According to the report, “Approximately 86 percent of homicide victims and suspects were known to the criminal justice system prior to the incident. Among all victims and suspects, about 46 percent had been previously incarcerated.” Further, “most victims and suspects with prior criminal offenses had been arrested about 11 times for about 13 different offenses by the time of the homicide.”

Data in a 2023 D.C. Sentencing Commission report revealed that out of a total of 5,558 MPD arrests for carrying a pistol without a license (CPWL) made between 2018 and 2022, 56.6% (3,146 cases) were “no papered” (“the prosecuting authority… elected not to immediately file charges in Superior Court related to the arrest”) or were closed without a conviction. Only 97 cases (1.74%) ultimately resulted in a prison sentence. The figures on arrests and dispositions for “unlawful possession of a firearm” (UPF) offenses show the odds in favor of lawbreakers were pretty good, too. Out of 2,149 total arrests made for UPF crimes in the same time period, the majority (62.6%, or 1,346 cases) were “no papered” or closed without a conviction. Of the remaining cases that resulted in a conviction and sentencing for UPF, only 14.5% (312 cases) concluded with the offender behind bars.

Sometimes an individual case can illustrate an issue better than a mountain of statistics.

On July 5, a high school social studies teacher visiting the federal enclave from Kentucky was shot to death on Catholic University’s campus during a robbery. At least some of the incident was captured by surveillance cameras. Police announced on July 11 that they had arrested a suspect in the case. Further, police say that they have matched the suspect’s DNA to a ski mask found at the scene of the crime.

Reporting on the suspect’s criminal record, Washington, D.C.’s NBC affiliate noted, “Public records show [the suspect] has a lengthy criminal history. He was arrested five times since 2019 and was convicted of carrying a pistol without a license, burglary and threats.”

The Washington Post elaborated, reporting,

D.C. police arrested [the suspect] during a traffic stop in 2019 and charged him with having an illegal firearm after finding a .40-caliber Glock loaded with 15 hollow-point bullets tucked under a sweater.

Court records show he pleaded guilty to carrying an unlicensed gun and was sentenced to probation, with a one-year prison term suspended. Those records show he violated the terms of his release and in 2020 was resentenced to six months in jail.

Authorities said that after his release, he continued to violate his release conditions, alleging that he failed to report to the probation office, among other issues. A hearing on those violations is scheduled for July 18.

Washington, D.C.’s FOX affiliate shared more details on a pair of 2022 incidents involving the suspect, reporting,

In May 2022 [the suspect] was charged after getting into a shootout with a neighbor and in August 2022, he was arrested with making threats of bodily harm to a 7-Eleven employee. He was convicted in March 2022 and released.

In the shootout case, investigators say an unregistered Ghost Gun was used. However, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. essentially dropped charges against [the suspect] after his attorney argued [the suspect] fired at his neighbor in self-defense. Charges were dropped in June, but a trial date had been set for July 10 — five days after Emerson was killed.

Targeting so-called “ghost guns” was purportedly so important to Mayor Muriel Bowser that in 2020 the District of Columbia enacted “Emergency Ghost Gun Legislation.”

The recent episodes in St. Louis and Washington, D.C. make clear that decisions to push gun control have little to do with public safety. Gun control offers unscrupulous politicians and their supporters a way to deflect from the repercussions of their own woeful mismanagement while often targeting the constituents of their political rivals.

Colorado Newspaper Editorial Scores Bullseye on Gun Control

A Sunday editorial in the Colorado Springs Gazette, reacting to a high-profile shooting incident last week in Auckland, N.Z., was on target when it stated, “Better control over known lawbreakers is likelier to forestall the next such tragedy than is another attempt to control guns.”

“Our state knows the pain of such seemingly random madness,” the editorial acknowledged, “so the incident was all too relatable. But it also offered a reminder of the limits of gun-control laws — repackaged nowadays in the U.S. as ‘gun safety’ laws — in curbing such violence. New Zealand’s crackdown on gun ownership in recent years obviously didn’t prevent this tragedy.”

In 2019, following a bloody attack on two mosques in Christchurch, N.Z., the government there cracked down hard on law-abiding gun owners. New laws forced gun owners to turn in—as part of a “buy back” which many have referred to as “compensated confiscation”—of thousands of firearms. As the Gazette editorial pointed out, those gun laws did not prevent last week’s shooting.

A man identified as Matu Tangi Matua Reid walked into a construction site, where he was employed, and opened fire with a pump-action shotgun, as reported by The Guardian. He killed two people and wounded several others including two police officers. He was found dead, possibly of a self-inflicted wound.

New Zealand authorities acknowledged Reid was on home detention but was allowed to go to work. He was doing time for a previous domestic violence offense.

The Gazette editorial was sprinkled with advice to Centennial State lawmakers, noting with no small irony how earlier this year, majority Democrats were congratulating one another for the gun restrictions they passed, including bans on so-called “ghost guns,” establishing a three-day waiting period on gun purchases, and raising the age for buying guns to 21 years.

“If only such measures could make a difference in heading off mass murder,” the Gazette editorial lamented. “If anything, they create a false hope.”

This is not a first for the newspaper in terms of going against the grain politically. Earlier, the Gazette published another editorial telling the Legislature to make fighting crime a priority.

Tennessee lawmakers standing firm on Second Amendment ahead of special session

Well, at least some of them are, and it sure looks like the opposition to Gov. Bill Lee’s “red flag” proposal is growing as we get closer to August 21st; the date when Lee says lawmakers will return to the capitol for a special session to respond to the Covenant School shooting in Nashville earlier this year.

Though we’re less than a month away from the start of that expected session, Lee has yet to officially call lawmakers back to the state capitol as his office works behind the scenes to garner support for his “temporary mental health restraining order”. Meanwhile, many Republican lawmakers are speaking out against the proposal, while still trying to provide some political cover to the governor himself.

About 100 people came out for a 2nd Amendment rally Saturday at the Enoch community building at the Henry County Fairgrounds to hear local and area GOP officials speak about the session.

… State Sen. John Stevens, R-Huntingdon, seemed confident the state Senate won’t be moved by Lee’s gun law proposals, which many Republicans have likened to a “red flag law.”

“The Senate is never going to walk back our 2nd Amendment rights,” he said. “Some of the leftists want this. Governor Lee is not a leftist.”

State Rep. Tandy Darby, R-Greenfield, also was careful not to criticize Lee in general, but only on this issue.

“I respect him, but I’m not on the same page as the governor on this. This looks like a red flag law,” said Darby.

Darby warned that on Aug. 21, when the special session begins, “all eyes will be on Tennessee. There’s nobody else in session (across the country).”

State Rep. Jay Reedy, R-Erin, who represents about a third of Henry County (Darby represents the rest), seemed unhappy a special session had been called at all.

“Some people think that, on August 21, we’re gonna solve all of Tennessee’s problems. No, we’re not,” Reedy said. “We’re just months away from our regular session, where we could have real in-depth conversations about this.”

Darby’s right that Tennessee’s special session will draw national attention, not only because even most full-time legislatures will be in recess when the session is slated to kick off in late August, but because of the topic at hand. Lee’s proposal for a “temporary mental health restraining order” isn’t going to be the only topic of discussion, and Democrats are expected to bring their own anti-gun bills to Nashville, including a more traditional “red flag” law, bans on gun sales to under-21s, and prohibiting the sale of so-called assault weapons and large capacity magazines.

Those bills won’t go far in the Republican-dominated legislature, but there are clearly a lot of conservatives who are worried about the political cost of standing pat. That’s why we’re starting to see some alternatives to Lee’s proposal emerge, including one piece of legislation that I believe would offer a substantial improvement to the status quo while still protecting Tennesseans’ Second Amendment rights.  As we reported last week, Rep. Scott Cepcicky is proposing the state build nine new mental health facilities, each with 150 inpatient beds. That would almost quadruple the number of state-funded beds available for inpatient care, though at a price tag of nearly $500-million.

Cepcicky told the Tennessean newspaper that the outlay would be “a significant investment in providing opportunities for people to get the help they need in both inpatient, outpatient and long term care,” and he’s not wrong. Not everyone suffering from mental illness is a threat to the public or themselves (in fact, the vast majority of those diagnosed will never be accused of a violent crime), but they’re still suffering, and there’s an acute lack of care for those most in need of help. Cepcicky’s legislation, if approved, would mark a major step towards eliminating the crisis in mental health care in Tennessee, and could be an example for other states to follow.

Of course, there’s no guarantee that Cepcicky’s legislation will be adopted, any more than Lee’s version of a red flag is guaranteed to go down in flames. Tennessee’s Republican majority are largely saying the right things now, but gun owners need to keep up their contacts and pressure for lawmakers to do the right thing if and when they return to the state capitol later this summer.

Making it easier for people to possess the means to defend themselves against armed criminals apparently puzzles the overeducated expert.

Homicides in Brazil at the lowest level in over a decade, report says

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazilian researchers say the number of violent deaths last year reached the lowest level in more than a decade, puzzling some experts because there has been an explosion of firearms circulating in the country in recent years.

About 47,500 people were slain in Latin America’s largest nation in 2022, said a report Thursday by the Brazilian Forum on Public Safety, an independent group that tracks crimes. Its statistics are widely used as a benchmark because there are no official statistics on a national level.

While the number of killings in 2022 was down 2.4% from the previous year, it remained roughly even with levels recorded since 2019. The last time Brazil had less violent deaths was in 2011, with 47,215 killings.

The fall in homicides has left many public security experts somewhat puzzled, as it has been accompanied by a sharp increase in the number of firearms held by Brazilians. Some studies have suggested that more guns circulating among the population lead to more homicides.

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San Francisco Backs Down, Tables Bill That Would Make Most of the City a ‘Sensitive Place,’ Ban Concealed Carry

From the CCRKBA . . .

The San Francisco County Board of Supervisors has backed down on a proposed ordinance that would make much of the city into a “gun-free zone” after the Second Amendment Foundation and California Rifle & Pistol Association promised legal action.

The proposal was championed by Supervisor Catherine Stefani, who essentially tabled the motion indefinitely, after bemoaning the 2023 Supreme Court Bruen decision, which is giving gun control proponents fits, while jarring the San Francisco Police Department to start issuing carry permits. She referenced, perhaps as a face-saving maneuver, proposed state legislation that may be adopted later this summer by lawmakers in Sacramento, as a reason to stand down on the proposed ordinance.

“This happened after CRPA and SAF sent a letter to the Board of Supervisors explaining why the planned ordinance would be unconstitutional,” said CRPA President Chuck Michel, a longtime practicing attorney and gun rights authority in California. “It is truly unfortunate that San Francisco politicians refuse to respect the Second Amendment and can’t accept the new legal reality that people have a Second Amendment right to carry a firearm in public.”

“As soon as we were advised of this proposal,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb, “we took action. This is not the first time we’ve had to stop extremist gun control in San Francisco. We successfully sued the city twice over attempted handgun bans, and won both times. We’re prepared to do it again, but our letter to the Board of Supervisors evidently has made that unnecessary.”

“Our warning to the Board of Supervisors was direct and left little room for doubt about our intentions,” noted SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut. “The letter clearly explained why the proposal was bad policy, and would result in another SAF-CRPA victory. We also reminded the Board it should wait to see whether the state legislation is adopted and how it fares under litigation. That appears to have had the desired impact.”

U.S. Senate Quietly Adds Permanent Gun Control Law Into 2024 NDAA Authorization

Republicans and Democrats are reportedly working together to end the sunset provision on a law gun rights orgs call ‘a backdoor gun ban’

As Congress begins consideration of the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), Senate leaders are attempting to quietly slip in gun control legislation.

The discovery was made by the Second Amendment advocacy group Gun Owners of America, who combed through the text and found an amendment inserted into the bill that would indefinitely authorize the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988.

According to a version of the proposed NDAA bill dated July 13, the amendment introduced by Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) would end the sunset provision on the 1988 law, which criminalizes firearms unable to be detected by metal detectors and x-ray machines commonly used at airports.

Though the provision was introduced by a Democrat, gun rights organizations say that Republicans are also involved in the effort to permanently codify the gun control law.

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WDOC rolls out Restoration of Rights certificates

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (RELEASE) – The Wyoming Department of Corrections (WDOC) has begun accepting applications and evaluating discharging individuals on their eligibility to receive a restoration of rights certificate in the State of Wyoming.

The WDOC is able to begin this process due to a change in Wyoming Statute §7-13-105 that went into effect July 1, 2023, which allows individuals that are convicted as a first time, non-violent felon, to have their right to vote, along with the rights lost as outlined in W.S. §6-10-106 to be restored. The rights restored under W.S. §7-13-105 include the ability to be an elector or juror or to hold any office of honor, trust or profit within this state or to use or knowingly possess any firearm.

The WDOC is accepting applications by mail, by email or in person at the Central Office. For more information in regards to this process, please visit https://corrections.wyo.gov/restoration-of-rights. Senator Eric Barlow, who was the sponsor for the original bill, commented “I am thankful to those who supported allowing more folks who have fulfilled their debt to society to re-engage in the most foundational aspects of citizenship, including the right to hold public office, serve on a jury and exercise their Second Amendment rights. The Legislature recognized the importance of voting rights for these same folks several years ago and I was pleased to assist with that too. I appreciate the Department of Corrections for implementing this program in a timely and efficient manner.”

The Second Amendment Is The Great Unifier

We all want to protect what we love.

No matter your age, your background, your ethnicity, or your religious affiliation, there is one thing that we can all agree on: nothing is more important than protecting what you love.

Where we are divided is HOW we protect those things that are most precious to us.

People who ascribe to the anti-gun rhetoric and agenda, and who belong to groups such as Moms Demand Action (MDA), Everytown for Gun Safety, and Giffords Courage to Fight Gun Violence, all proclaim that saving lives is at the core of their mission. We all can applaud and agree on that. Life is precious. And each of us can name at least one life we want to protect.

But protecting what we love sometimes requires that good people stand against predators and murderers with the very tools that MDA, Everytown, and Giffords vilify: guns. People who understand that reality dedicate their own time, money, and energy to training themselves and others to be safe and responsible gun owners. This training and education is truly what will protect those you love.

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