Majority see FBI as Biden’s ‘personal Gestapo’ after Trump raid

The Justice-backed FBI raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago winter resort home has increased the percentage of people who believe that President Joe Biden is using the G-men as his “personal Gestapo.”

In the latest Rasmussen Reports survey, 53% of likely voters agreed that “there is a group of politicized thugs at the top of the FBI that are using the FBI as Joe Biden’s personal Gestapo.”

Asked the same question last December, the portion who agreed with that view was 46%.

In between, the agency increased its focus on Trump and reports that he hoarded documents from his administration stamped “secret” at Mar-a-Lago, which the national police agency raided last week, taking several boxes of documents, including Trump’s current and old passports.

The new survey was suggested by New York Post columnist Miranda Devine, who wrote today that conservatives have had it with the FBI, while liberals, once the agency’s biggest critics, have found a new love.

“Liberals are happy because a politicized agency is coming after their ideological enemies, particularly their bête noire, Trump. It’s a stark turnaround from the days of decrying the FBI’s efforts to target Martin Luther King. The left has discarded any pretense of caring about civil liberties or injustice and instead sneers at conservatives who they claim are the ones who have jettisoned their core principles and now are ‘anti-cop,’” she wrote.

The Gestapo charge was coined by Trump supporter Roger Stone.

“The agency’s standing is at rock bottom among Republicans and conservatives, and not too healthy with independents and moderates,” wrote Devine, the author of Laptop from Hell: Hunter Biden, Big Tech, and the Dirty Secrets the President Tried to Hide.

The details of the survey, shared with Secrets, will be unveiled later this morning.

Overall, said Rasmussen, the raid made voters trust the FBI less, though a majority still have a favorable opinion of the agency.

The survey found that 44% said they trust federal agents less, while 29% said they trust them more. But by a 50%-46% margin, voters have a favorable impression of the FBI. That is actually better than when the same question was asked in December.

 

No Clintons, no Bushes, no Kennedys. And shortly, no Cheneys.

BLUF
“There is a new 21st century American Revolution taking place. Except the kings and queens are not in England but here among us. The patriots are voting these Tories out of office. We can hardly wait for Nov. 8,”
–John McLaughlin

Liz Cheney ends 75 years of modern political dynasties

Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney’s GOP primary defeat this week did more than just end her family’s dominance in U.S. politics dating back to her father’s role as President Gerald Ford’s chief of staff in 1974.

It also marked the coming end of a long stretch of at least 75 years of somebody from one of America’s modern political dynasties serving in federal elected or appointed office.

Since 1947, when then-Sen. John F. Kennedy came to Washington, there has been either a Kennedy, a Bush, a Cheney, or a Clinton in office. There was a two-year gap, between 2011 and 2013, when none of those families held an elected seat, but Hillary Clinton was the secretary of state for President Barack Obama.

And the streak could be stretched back at least to 1933 and the Byrds of Virginia, including former Sens. Harry Byrd and Harry Byrd Jr. (who left the chamber in 1983).

Despite a Britain-born hatred for blood politics by colonial Americans that continues to this day in many political circles, the United States has voted in members of prominent political families, which makes Cheney’s loss on Tuesday all the more jarring.

“The end of political dynasties represents the decline of the establishment wings of both parties and the desire by voters to have change and new blood in Washington. It’s unlikely we are going to see a political dynasty endure like we have over the past 75 years,” said Ron Bonjean, a Republican strategist and former House and Senate official.

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Intel Officials Leak About What FBI Was Looking for in Trump Raid

According to a new report, the FBI was looking for documents that President Donald Trump thought would exonerate him from the Russia collusion claims and election-related charges. The report came from anonymous intelligence officials who leaked to Newsweek.

The FBI collected all of the documents that were government property and used concerns about classified documents to justify the raid, but agents were looking for Trump’s personal stash containing documents related to Russian collusion accusations against him, fearing that he would “weaponize” them, Newsweek reported. One former Trump official said he may have planned to use the documents to help in a presidential run in the coming term.

“Trump was particularly interested in matters related to the Russia hoax and the wrong-doings of the deep state,” the official told the outlet, adding that he may have intended to use the documents in a 2024 presidential campaign. “I think he felt, and I agree, that these are facts that the American people need to know.”

“The true target was these documents that Trump had been collecting since early in his administration,” the source said.

Trump issued a memo on declassifying Crossfire Hurricane documents.

This matches with the prior report from journalist Paul Sperry.

DEVELOPING: Investigators reportedly met back in June w Trump & his lawyers in Mar-a-Lago storage rm to survey docs & things seemed copasetic but then FBI raids weeks later. Speculation on Hill FBI had PERSONAL stake & searching for classified docs related to its #Spygate scandal.

In other words, it sounds like documents that would have shown the case was trumped up against him.

Russia collusion has already been disproven to most sensible people. So I’m not sure whatever the documents are would so much prove his innocence as they might be things that would indicate the guilt of others in plans/efforts against him.

Another new thing in the report from Newsweek is that it refers to 42 boxes “accidentally shipped.” That matches with the prior reports the GSA sent boxes to Trump. If so, that would make it harder to prosecute for things that Trump didn’t even remove.

So add one more report to the story that the raid isn’t exactly about what the FBI has claimed it’s about.

I give this less than a month before it’s either quietly deactivated, or the ATF section involved simply disregards the thousands of daily reports that become an unmanageable heap of meaningless drivel.

ATF launches anonymous gun crime reporting app

On Friday, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) announced a new app that will allow users to make anonymous tips about crimes involving firearms, explosives, arson and more.

The ATF tweeted that the bureau is working with Report It, a mobile app that uses “AI inspired technology” to help “prevent incidents before they occur,” according to the company’s website. The ATF app gives users a simple way to “anonymously and confidentially submit tips about crimes.”

“ATF partners with Report It® to provide a simple to use mobile app allowing users to anonymously and confidentially submit tips about crimes happening in communities involving firearms, explosives, arson, and violent crime. For more, go to https://atf.gov/atf-tips. #ATF50 #ATFtips,” the agency tweeted.

The ATF says on its website that the app is designed to “protect our communities” through a public-private partnership.“We look to you who live in these communities we protect to provide us with information about gun violence,” the ATF website states.

A look inside the ATF’s anonymous tip line app. (Screenshot)

“To make our communities safer, ATF is launching a new way to collect your tips involving firearms or to provide leads to help us prevent crimes from happening,” it continues. “Using your phone, tablet or computer, you will be able to tell us instantly and anonymously about crimes that may be happening in your communities that involve firearms, explosives, violent crime, or arson.”

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Fatal stabbing at SW Kan. home was in self-defense

FINNEY COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities investigating the fatal stabbing of 58-year-old Robert Gallardo Molina in Garden City on Thursday have presented evidence to the Finney County Attorney, according to a media release from police.

Just after 5:30.m. Thursday, police were dispatched to the 400 block of E. Santa Fe Street in Garden City for a reported stabbing.

First responders found Molina stabbed inside the residence where relatives lived, according to a social media report. EMS transported Molina to St. Catherine Hospital, where he later died.

The evidence gathered in the case was reviewed by the Garden City Police Department and the Finney County Attorney’s Office. At this time, both police and the Finney County Attorney agree the evidence available provides probable cause that the suspect in this matter acted in self-defense, and therefore no arrests should be made, and no charges will be filed.

If additional evidence comes to light indicating this homicide was not justified by self-defense, the Garden City Police Department and the Finney County Attorney will re-evaluate the case to determine if charges should be filed at that time.

To trust arms in the hands of the people at large has, in Europe, been believed…to be an experiment fraught only with danger. Here by a long trial it has been proved to be perfectly harmless…If the government be equitable; if it be reasonable in its exactions; if proper attention be paid to the education of children in knowledge and religion, few men will be disposed to use arms, unless for their amusement, and for the defence of themselves and their country. — Timothy Dwight, Travels in New England and New York, 1823

Giffords Says This is Gun Safety Week, So Let’s Talk ACTUAL Gun Safety

If you follow the big gun control orgs’ accounts on social media, chances are you’ve already come across a post like this one . . .

 

That’s right, the Giffords civilian disarmament operation has unilaterally declared this Gun Owners for Safety Week and are using it to push their message of gun control under the guise of “gun safety” and “standing up to the gun lobby.”

So, in the spirit of Gun Owners For Safety Week, I think we need to amplify responsible gun ownership, too. That’s always a good idea. If you aren’t already familiar with them, here are the four rules of gun safety that every gun owner should know and practice.

But we all know that groups like Giffords aren’t really concerned about actual firearm safety as much as as they are control those who own guns. Even if every single armed citizen was the very model of gun safety, never doing anything even remotely questionable and only using firearms outside of a range for and clear-cut cases of self defense, that still wouldn’t satisfy them.

That’s why they’re pumping messages like this one . . .

 

The real goal here, of course, is to push and pass restrictive laws — think: universal background checks, gun owners licensing, waiting periods and “safe storage” mandates — to the point where lawfully-possessed guns aren’t only mostly useless for armed self-defense, but are utterly worthless against a tyrannical government, too.

Reducing their usefulness as defensive tools against the kind of criminals the average citizen is likely to encounter is just a happy side effect of their real objective: making life safer for illiberal governments and their enforcers.

But they know we know this. They’re not trying to change our minds here. They want the general public — the majority who don’t know much about the issues surrounding firearms and gun rights — to rethink what “safety” is. Instead of being about the practices an individual should adopt for basic firearm safety, they want people to think that “gun safety” comes from the imposition of “commonsense” gun control laws.

They want John and Jane Q. Public to think that gun owners don’t give a damn about safety, when precisely the opposite is the truth. We all started out dumb about guns at some point and were corrected by a parent, an instructor, a range safety officer, or a mentor. Some of us have had worse experiences that woke us up. But the general public hasn’t had that experience. They don’t know (and don’t want others to know) how seriously safety is taken as a normal part of the gun culture.

That’s why a lack of basic, fundamental gun safety practices isn’t tolerated in the gun-owning community.

To spread that message even further, we need to be reminding people of three things:

  • What actual gun safety really is
  • That we take it seriously
  • That passing laws can’t make bad owners or criminals into good ones

What Real Gun Safety Is

Real gun safety doesn’t come from collective action. It doesn’t come from laws. It doesn’t come from firearms design (assuming the design isn’t seriously defective). It doesn’t come from your gun shop, or even from a firearms instructor. Ultimately, gun safety lies in the hands of the individual holding a gun. Everyone else can do everything right, but if you as the owner don’t adopt safe practices, none of that matters one little bit.

negligent unintentional discharge training range
Courtesy Jeff Gonzales

That’s why, long ago, various groups of firearm owners and gun-carrying professionals came up with safety rules which we’re all expected to know and practice. While the exact wording differs, the Four Rules cover things really well . . .

“The Four Rules of Gun Safety”

If you take any basic class given by a reputable instructor, you will start off with gun safety before ever going to the range. Beyond what’s contained in the Four Rules (or the NRA’s 3 rules, if that’s what you learned), there are other safety considerations to know including . . . .

  • The gun needs to be safe to operate
  • You need to know how to use it safely
  • Use the correct ammo
  • Wear eye and ear protection
  • Never use alcohol or drugs while shooting
  • Keep guns away from unauthorized people (children, thieves, etc.)
  • Range safety procedures and rules

As a community, we take these rules seriously. To be told by gun control advocacy operations — of all people — that they’re the ones who really care about firearm safety is not only false, it’s downright insulting. We need to make sure everyone hears this.

Biden invites gun control groups to White House to help “heal the soul of a nation”

Makes sense. After all, nothing promotes unity like demonizing 80-100 million gun owners and threatening to turn them into criminals if they don’t register or turn their AR-15s over to the government, right?

Next month Joe Biden’s going to be hosting a “United We Stand Summit” that’s ostensibly about the “corrosive effects” of threats of violence on our political system and public life; an event that White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre claims will be “important opportunity for Americans of all races, religions, regions, political affiliations, and walks of life to take up that cause together.” If you don’t believe in gun-controlling our way to “unity”, however, expect your invite to get lost in the mail.

Biden will deliver a keynote speech at the gathering, which the White House says will include civil rights groups, faith leaders, business executives, law enforcement, gun violence prevention advocates, former members of violent hate groups, the victims of extremist violence and cultural figures. The White House emphasized that it also intends to bring together Democrats and Republicans, as well as political leaders on the federal, state and local levels to unite against hate-motivated violence.

You know, there are plenty of new gun owners out there who specifically bought a firearm because they’re worried about being the victim of “extremist violence” who might also have a thing or two to say about the idiocy of trying to reduce violence by preventing people from defending themselves, but Biden and his allies have no interest in hearing from those folks. In fact, for an event that’s ostensibly about promoting unity, it sure seems awfully divisive in nature.

Sindy Benavides, the CEO of League of United Latin American Citizens, said the genesis of the summit came after the Buffalo massacre, as her organization along with the Anti-Defamation League, the National Action Network and other groups wanted to press the Biden administration to more directly tackle extremist threats.

“As civil rights organizations, social justice organizations, we fight every day against this, and we wanted to make sure to acknowledge that government needs to have a leading role in addressing right-wing extremism,” she said.

… Benavides said Biden holding the summit would help galvanize the country to address the threats of hate-inspired violence but also said she hoped for “long-term solutions” to emerge from the summit.

“What’s important to us is addressing mental health, gun control reform, addressing misinformation, disinformation and malinformation,” she said. “We want policy makers to focus on common sense solutions so we don’t see this type of violence in our communities. And we want to see the implementation of policies that reduce violence.”

Sounds like less of a summit and more like a pep rally for Democrats to me; a day where Biden and his closest allies can portray Republicans as “right wing extremists” and push for more divisive gun control laws ahead of the midterms.

The divides in this country are obviously growing deeper by the day, but this event is likely to flame those tensions instead of alleviating them. I truly hope I’m wrong, but given the blatantly partisan nature of this “unity summit,” it’s hard to predict otherwise.

Ex-Gorsuch Law Clerk Takes a Blowtorch to the Imaginary Law Violations the FBI Cited in Trump Raid

It’s a move that House Republicans should consider when they regain the majority in November, but will they do it? In the aftermath of the unlawful August 8 raid on Mar-a-Lago, the Republican Party has been united in its revulsion of what appears to be an unprecedented ransacking of a former president’s home. The legal justification doesn’t pass constitutional muster. There seems to be no crime committed, only that the National Archives grew impatient over record retrieval. That’s not a crime; people dragging their feet regarding government documents is quite common in DC.

Mike Davis has gone on epic threads on social media gutting the case the government has made for the raid. Davis, a former law clerk to Justice Neil Gorsuch, decided to take his legal takedowns of this arguably illegal search and reorganize it into an opinion column for Newsweek. He took the position many have felt for a long time: FBI Director Chris Wray, and now Attorney General Merrick Garland should be removed from office. He also added that it’s telling why AG Garland did not seek the opinion of the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel about signing off on the search warrant (via Newsweek):

All presidents take mementos and other records when they leave office. They don’t pack their own boxes. The National Archives takes the position that almost everything is a “presidential record.” And the federal government, in general, over-classifies almost everything.

Even if Trump took classified records, that isn’t a crime. The president has the inherent constitutional power to declassify any record he wants, in any manner he wants, regardless of any otherwise-pertinent statute or regulation that applies to everyone else. The president does not need to obtain Congress’ or a bureaucrat’s permission—or jump through their regulatory or statutory hoops—to declassify anything.

The Supreme Court reaffirmed this in the 1988 case, Department of the Navy v. Egan : “The President, after all, is the ‘Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States.’ U.S. Const., Art. II, § 2. His authority to classify and control access to information bearing on national security…flows primarily from this constitutional investment of power in the President, and exists quite apart from any explicit congressional grant.”

Thus, if Trump left the White House with classified records, then those records are necessarily declassified by his very actions. He doesn’t need to label that decision for, or report that decision to, any bureaucrat who works for him. It is pretextual legal nonsense for the Biden Justice Department to pretend Trump broke any criminal statute. Indeed, it is noteworthy that Attorney General Garland apparently did not seek an opinion from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC)—the de facto general counsel for the executive branch—before ordering this home raid of his boss’s chief political enemy. Perhaps Garland knew OLC wouldn’t give him the answer he wanted.[…]

All former presidents also get a federally funded office, called the Office of the Former President. They get lawyers and other staff, security clearances, Secret Service protection, and secure facilities (SCIFs) for the maintenance of classified records. Even if Trump had classified records, then, they were protected and secure.[…]

FBI Director Christopher Wray recently testified that the FBI was too busy to stop dangerous and illegal intimidation campaigns outside Supreme Court justices’ homes. This was after an attempted assassin was thankfully arrested outside Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s home. The FBI apparently didn’t have the time to investigate actual threats to the lives of constitutional officers, but it had plenty of time to raid the home of a former president over an 18-month-old records dispute—with which Trump publicly stated he was fully cooperating.[…]

House Republicans must impeach Attorney General Garland and FBI Director Wray for their unprecedented and destructive politicization of the Justice Department, when they reclaim power in January. And over the long term, House and Senate Republicans must dismantle and rebuild the FBI, so political raids like this never happen again. We cannot allow our law enforcement agencies to become third-world political hit squads.

It’s a line-by-line takedown of the DOJ’s overreach. The Presidential Records Act isn’t a criminal statute. Since Trump was president, the removal of alleged classified materials isn’t a crime. The president is the ultimate decider on classification status, which dresses down the violation of the Espionage Act allegation as lunacy.

Davis also highlights the gross incompetence and hyper-politicization that has engulfed the Justices Department, noting the FBI’s inability to protect sitting Supreme Court justices from death threats after the Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade, because they were too busy. And yet, the FBI had plenty of time to pursue this search of Mar-a-Lago with a 30-person team following a treasure hunt over allegations that aren’t crimes regarding Donald Trump and classified materials. People were showing up at the homes of Supreme Court justices; some were armed and prepared to commit political acts of violence over abortion. That was real. The purported classified documents at Mar-a-Lago are not actual law violations, but Garland’s presser, which gave this smash-and-grab a federal blessing, tossed him into the same rogue camp as Wray.

House Republicans promised investigations into these egregious acts of extrajudicial operations conducted by the DOJ.  They better make good on those overtures, leaving the door open for possible impeachment articles against these two men.

Young v. Hawaii

George Young, a Vietnam veteran, wants to openly carry a firearm for self‐​defense in his home state of Hawaii. Hawaii allows firearms to be openly carried only by those who are “engaged in the protection of life and property.” Young was denied his permit twice and filed suit in federal district court. Young’s suit was summarily dismissed three times before he obtained pro‐​bono counsel to appeal to the Ninth Circuit.

The Ninth Circuit, in an in‐​depth and historically rooted decision, held that the Second Amendment does in fact protect the right of law‐​abiding citizens to openly carry a firearm. The Ninth Circuit then decided to hear the case en banc—meaning every judge on the circuit will hear the case rather than the typical three‐​judge panel—but that hearing was delayed pending the Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. New York. Unfortunately, that case was dismissed by the Court as moot after the city changed its law in order to prevent a pro‐​Second Amendment decision.

Now the full Ninth Circuit is ready to hear Mr. Young’s case and Cato has joined with many Second Amendment groups and law professors on a brief discussing the original meaning of the Second Amendment and historical practice of carrying a firearm. We argue that contemporary understandings of the word “bear” are synonymous with “carry,” and that it was not limited to a military context. We also survey early colonial laws and show that carrying was common and legal. Finally, we discuss how individual Founders, such as John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, carried weapons for self protection.

The history is clear: arms were borne by common people for self‐​defense, and the Second Amendment protects that right. The Ninth Circuit should follow the panel decision, overrule the district court, and protect Young’s right to defend himself.

Jetson Completes the World’s First Ever Evtol Commute.

After months of trial and testing, Swedish company Jetson has conducted the first commuter flight of its Jetson ONE eVTOL. The footage, which was shared last week via social media, shows co-founder and Jetson ONE inventor Tomasz Patan flying from home to work. While exact details of the flight time and distance have yet to be revealed, the company has called it a ‘momentous occasion’ saying it reduced Patan’s commute time by an impressive 88%.

Fauci and Walensky Double Down on Failed Covid Response

Wonder Land: Like other world leaders who leaned into lockdowns, Joe Biden and the Democratic Party are now realizing how complicated the private economy actually is, and how easy it is to wreck it.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention belatedly admitted failure this week. “For 75 years, CDC and public health have been preparing for Covid-19, and in our big moment, our performance did not reliably meet expectations,” Director Rochelle Walensky said. She vowed to establish an “action-oriented culture.”

Lockdowns and mask mandates were the most radical experiment in the history of public health, but Dr. Walensky isn’t alone in thinking they failed because they didn’t go far enough. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to the president, recently said there should have been “much, much more stringent restrictions” early in the pandemic.

The World Health Organization is revising its official guidance to call for stricter lockdown measures in the next pandemic, and it is even seeking a new treaty that would compel nations to adopt them. The World Economic Forum hails the Covid lockdowns as the model for a “Great Reset” empowering technocrats to dictate policies world-wide.

It was bad enough that Dr. Fauci, the CDC and the WHO ignored the best scientific advice at the start of this pandemic. It’s sociopathic for them to promote a worse catastrophe for future outbreaks. If a drug company behaved this way, ignoring evidence while marketing an ineffective treatment with fatal side effects, its executives would be facing lawsuits, bankruptcy and probably criminal charges. Dr. Fauci and his fellow public officials can’t easily be sued, but they need to be put out of business long before the next pandemic.


BLUF
What the CDC pushed on the country, even the world, was without precedent. The resulting disasters are everywhere present. At minimum we should expect the CDC to cease and desist, and certainly not entrench and codify. That the latter is taking place reveals what a long struggle lies ahead.

CDC Wants Its Covid Regime Made Permanent

There is no remorse at the CDC. Far from it. The model of virus control deployed over the last 27 months is now part of normal operations. It wants it institutionalized.

The bureaucracy has now codified this into a new online tool that instructs cities and states precisely of what they are supposed to do given a certain level of community spread. The new tool doesn’t say lockdowns as such but the entire model of containment via masks and distancing is baked in, and it can be easily expanded at will.

To understand how absurd this is, consider that as of this writing, major parts of Southern Florida are supposed to be masked up, according to the map provided by the CDC, because covid testing reveals high community spread.

Hardly anyone in Florida has worn a mask since 2020. The very notion is a joke there. However, what happens to the other states and what happens when or if political control of Florida changes to a pro-lockdown party?

Under the orange label (high), the following pertains:

  • Wear a mask indoors in public
  • Stay up to date with COVID-19 vaccines
  • Get tested if you have symptoms
  • Additional precautions may be needed for people at high risk for severe illness

Some standout points here. Masks have nowhere controlled the spread of covid. We know this from countless examples all over the world. They have been a spectacular failure except as signals to others to feel a sense of alarm at the presence of disease. Neither have vaccinations achieved the stopping or even slowing of infection or spread. Note the new language too: “Stay up to date.” Vaccinations are headed toward the WEF ideal of subscription plans.

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I can say it sure didn’t help! But, after it became clear she was nothing but an eastern carpetbagger using here father’s coattails, the people of Wyoming had had enough of her.

Trounced: Was Liz Cheney’s Gun Control Vote the Final Straw?

U.S.A. -(AmmoLand.com)- Soon-to-be former Wyoming Congresswoman Liz Cheney evidently forgot the wisdom of late House Speaker Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill, who once famously observed, “All politics is local.”

She was trounced in the primary by a better than 2-to-1 margin, losing to Harriet Hageman 66.3-28.9 percent. Much of it is blamed on Cheney’s vote to impeach former President Donald Trump and then sit as vice chair on the controversial Jan. 6 committee, which conservative commentators liken to a kangaroo court whose ultimate goal is to prevent Trump from running for another term in 2024.

As noted by Fox News, Cheney couldn’t concede without stating, “I will do whatever it takes to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office.”

Hageman had Trump’s endorsement, and Cheney is now one more Republican who lost their job during primaries after voting for impeachment. The Baltimore Sun reported that 10 House Republicans “backed Trump’s impeachment in the days after his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol as Congress tried to certify President Joe Biden’s victory.”

The story also said Cheney sought assistance from Democrats to retain her seat, and “Democrats across America, major donors among them, took notice. She raised at least $15 million for her election, a stunning figure for a Wyoming political contest.” A check on Cheney’s campaign contributions confirms she got a lot of money from out-of-state donors.

But is there another reason Cheney’s Capitol Hill career bit the dust? Earlier this year, she was one of 13 House Republicans to cross the aisle and vote with Democrats to pass Joe Biden’s far-reaching gun control bill, dubbed the “Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.” Whatever else Wyoming may be, it is definitely “gun country,” and it doesn’t help a politician running for office there to help pass a gun control measure.

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Why More Americans Are Becoming First-Time Gun Owners
Many Americans are turning to firearm ownership for many different reasons – much of it having nothing to do with politics but a need to protect themselves.

Why Is Gun Ownership Up? Expert Analysis and Some Personal Stories: Following the start of the global novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic in early 2020, firearms sales steadily picked up. By the end of the year, 2020 had seen the strongest sales of guns in the history of the United States. It was driven significantly by many “first-time” buyers – those who had never previously owned a firearm.

According to data from the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the firearms industry trade association, there were some five million first-time gun buyers in 2020 – while other statistics put the number significantly higher. What is also notable is that in the months that have followed, many of those individuals have become repeat customers, with nearly 23 percent of retailers reporting that those new owners made a second firearm purchase in 2021.

The impact of the pandemic, followed by summer 2020’s wave of violent protests that coincided with calls to “defund the police” and then the election of Joe Biden to the White House, can’t be overstated. By comparison, just 2.4 million Americans became new gun owners in 2019.

Sales Remain Strong in 2022

As the country settles into a “post-pandemic” new normal, firearm sales have fallen this year, but still remain above pre-pandemic levels. Gun sales this past spring saw year-over-year declines, yet are outpacing 2019 and all years prior. More significantly, the trend was reversed in June, which had the first year-over-year increase of 2022 – with firearm sales up 7.7 percent compared to June 2021.

“The June 2022 data are of interest in that they reflect this calendar year’s first year-over-year increase in firearms unit sales,” explained Small Arms Analytics (SAAF) chief economist Jurgen Brauer. “This increase possibly was due to the discussion regarding additional federal firearms legislation that some customers may have viewed as detrimental to their interests even as the industry as a whole has been not wholly unsupportive of the final bill signed into law by President Biden.”

The passage of new gun safety legislation, the first in nearly 30 years, likely spurred the spike in sales earlier this summer. Moreover, according to the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), there have now been 36 straight months of sales in excess of one million units.

More First-Time Buyers

Gun sales have continued to remain strong in 2022, and a driving factor is once again those first-time buyers – who are increasingly more diverse than ever.

Instead of the “redneck” firearms enthusiasts – which is how gun control groups have long painted Americans who support the Second Amendment – new data found that in 2021, some 33 percent of first-time gun buyers were women, while the number of African Americans purchasing firearms increased by 44 percent, and Hispanic Americans who purchased a firearm jumped by 40 percent.

“Gun owners no longer fit into the tiny little boxes gun control groups wish to put us in,” said NSSF director of public affairs Mark Olivia. “Today’s gun owner is younger, more urban, and more representative of the different demographic groups we see across America.”

Clearly, more Americans are exercising their Second Amendment rights, something President Biden and the gun control groups will eventually have to accept.

What Two First-Time Gun Owners Told 19FortyFive

We reached out to several new gun owners to get their perspectives on why they made the decision they did. Two new owners agreed to speak to us on the condition they not be named and that we respect their right to privacy and not share any identifying information.

Smith & Wesson Model 610 Gun

Smith & Wesson Model 610. Image: Smith & Wesson.

One new gun owner based in Maryland explained he purchased a simple .38 revolver to protect his convenience store, which was robbed twice in the last year. “I was tired of working so hard to only have my profits stolen from me,” explained the shopkeeper, a third-generation small business owner. “I hate guns to be honest, but I need to protect my countless hours of hard work and provide for my family. They need to know I will come home every night to them. A firearm makes me feel I can do that.”

Another store owner, operating a small deli in Ithaca, New York, explained to 19FortyFive that she purchased a firearm for her home and business for self-defense. “The riots and chaos of 2020 really have me very concerned. My choice to purchase a gun does not have anything to do with politics – I am a registered Democrat, to be honest. I just want to feel safe.”

Brazils’ Gun Economy Thriving Under President Bolsonaro

Brazilian President Jai Bolsonaro supports a civilian “army” by implementing looser gun policies, allowing many to own firearms.

The 67-year-old ex-army captain promised the country to “give my life to defend our freedom.” And now, one way he’s reportedly doing that is by allowing Brazilians to have an accessible process for gun ownership.

Wagner Carneiro, a former Brazilian army sergeant, said he needed the gun to protect his family. Carneiro cited a previous incident when a man asked for random directions and then suddenly pointed a gun to his head and stole his mobile phone. He believes that with a weapon, incidents like these would be more preventable.

Many are thanking Bolsonaro after the implementation of the new policy as the country loosens restrictions on gun ownership for civilians.

“Expanding the right of the population to bear arms has been one of Bolsonaro’s main electoral promises from day one,” says Fábio Zanini, a columnist for Folha de S.Paulo, a leading Brazilian newspaper. “Gun owners are one of his main electoral bases.”

Schutzenfest
Schutzenfest Poster (Source: Schützenfest Jaraguá/Facebook)

Aside from Brazilians expanding their interests around gun ownership, a lot of private-owned gun stores are thriving. In addition, there are various shooting tournaments happening all over Brazil, including the large-scale Schützenfest, where nationals of German descent can join and participate. The event will also include beer-drinking parades like Oktoberfest (but with guns).

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