New Data Shatters Liberal Myths About Gun Violence & Constitutional Carry

Amid constant leftist fearmongering about the supposedly disastrous consequences of allowing Americans to exercise their Second Amendment freedoms, new data shows that expanding rights for responsible gun owners – and actually punishing gun crimes – makes states safer.

According to a report from Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost released in January, “six of Ohio’s eight largest cities saw less gun crime after the state’s ‘constitutional carry’ law took effect.” In June 2022, Ohio became the 23rd state in the nation to legalize constitutional carry, or permitless carry, which allows residents to carry a concealed firearm without having to undergo a burdensome and time-consuming permitting process. Since then, four more states have passed constitutional carry, bringing the total to 27.

Notably, Ohio’s law as well as constitutional carry laws in other states still prohibit certain people from buying or possessing a firearm, such as felons, people convicted of domestic violence, and individuals with serious mental health conditions. Legal gun owners in Ohio are also still prohibited from carrying inside schools and government buildings, and are not allowed to consume any alcohol while carrying, also tracking with other states.

As has been the case wherever conservatives advance pro-Second Amendment legislation, Ohio liberals vehemently opposed the institution of constitutional carry, insisting that it would lead to a rise in gun violence. Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther called permitless carry “reckless and dangerous,” while the Ohio Democrat Party predicted the change would “make all Ohioans less safe” and increase gun crime.

But the data cited by Yost’s office shows that the exact opposite occurred. In the capital of Columbus and Ohio’s largest city, the rate per 1,000 residents of crime incidents involving a firearm declined from 10.79 in the period June 2021 to June 2022 (one year before constitutional carry took effect) to 9.55 in the period June 2022 to June 2023 (one year after constitutional carry took effect). Every other major city in the state except Cincinnati and Dayton saw a similar decline.

As Yost emphasized, the report does not “downplay the very real problem of crime in many neighborhoods in our cities – you don’t need a research team to see that gun violence destroys lives, families and opportunity.” However, he continued, “The key takeaway from this study is that we have to keep the pressure on the criminals who shoot people, rather than Ohioans who responsibly exercise their Second Amendment rights.”

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I don’t have a bump stock, never did, probably never will. But when bureaucraps redefine a law to suit a political agenda restricting the people’s exercise of a right, they need to get slapped down….hard.

CRPA & Allies File SCOTUS Amicus Brief in Garland v. Cargill

CRPA has joined with several other pro 2A organizations and filed a friend of the court “amicus” legal brief in Garland v. Cargill. The case is set for argument before the Supreme Court on February 28, 2024.

The Cargill case will decide whether a bump stock device is a “machinegun” as defined in 26 U.S.C. § 5845(b) because it is designed and intended for use in converting a rifle into a machinegun, i.e., into a weapon that fires “automatically more than one shot … by a single function of the trigger.”

The case is primarily about the scope of the ATF’s regulatory authority and whether it can freely change its positions and interpretations of federal law. It does not explicitly involve any Second Amendment claims. Nonetheless, our amicus brief advises the Court about the significant risk to Second Amendment rights if it rules in favor of the ATF. The ATF has shown an unfortunate willingness to reverse its opinion about the legality of a device whenever it suits the political whims of the Biden administration.

ATF did this on bump stocks, incomplete lower receivers, and pistol braces. So our amicus brief warns the Court that if it finds that a bump stock is a “machine gun,” the logical next step that ATF, or governments hostile to the Second Amendment, could pursue would be to reclassify most or all semiautomatic rifles as illegal fully-automatic machineguns because they could be converted (illegally) to fully automatic. There is support for that position in the Seventh Circuit’s recent absurd ruling upholding Illinois’s “assault weapon” ban, where it wrongly concluded that the semi-automatic AR-15 and the fully automatic M-16 were virtually indistinguishable so that semi-automatic rifles can be banned.

The amicus brief lays out a history demonstrating that Americans have always owned so-called “military” small arms, and expanding the ATF’s authority such that it believes it could regulate semiautomatic firearms would cause chaos and potentially millions of accidental criminals.

Joining CRPA on the brief are the Second Amendment Law Center, Second Amendment Defense and Education Coalition, Federal Firearms Licensees of Illinois, and Guns Save Life. Multiple additional briefs are expected to be filed in the next few days.

The brief urges the Supreme Court to affirm the 5th Circuit’s ruling in favor of Mr. Cargill, and to reaffirm that commonly possessed semiautomatic rifles cannot be banned.  You can read the brief HERE.

“Secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy … censorship.
When any government, or any church, for that matter, undertakes to say to it’s subjects, ‘This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know,’ the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives.
Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything.
You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him.”
–Robert A. Heinlein,

Alaska joins 28-states in urging Biden admin to not restrict ammunition sales

Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor signed onto a 28-state letter to the Biden administration, responding to another letter that had urged the administration to restrict ammunition manufacturers who receive federal funds from selling ammunition to citizens.

“We Have seen this administration take full advantage of wordplay to restrict the rights of American citizens,” Gov. Mike Dunleavy said in a Jan. 26 statement. “Politicians, ignorant of the tools and practices they fight to restrict, use catchphrases like ‘military grade’ to create the illusion that these rights are not meant for the average citizen. They hate that law-abiding citizens have these rights and will use these underhanded tactics to take them away if allowed. I will always fight to preserve those rights given to citizens at the time our nation was founded and the ability to exercise those rights. In this case, that means fighting to ensure that citizens who have the right to arms also have reasonable access to ammunition.”

The original letter, written by leaders of several Democrat-led states requests that the Biden administration investigate Lake City Army Ammunition Plant. The letter claims that ammunition manufacturers who receive federal funds should not be allowed to also sell ammunition to the general public, and states that the ammunition has been used by mass shooters to commit crimes.

The response letter, joined by Alaska, argues that this restriction would limit law-abiding citizens’ ability to obtain ammunition and to exercise their Second Amendment rights.

240125-Letter

New Mexico House Committee Moves 3 Gun Bills Forward


Nice PID

Gun control legislation continued to make headway in the Legislature Thursday, with three key bills getting through a House committee as Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham proclaimed she remains confident the controversial measures will eventually land on her desk.

One bill would limit magazine sizes and ban some types of semiautomatic rifles; one would raise the age to legally buy or possess an automatic or semiautomatic firearm from 18 to 21; and one would impose a 14-day waiting period on gun purchases. All three advanced out of the House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee on 4-2 party-line votes and now head to House Judiciary.

Thursday’s lengthy hearing — almost six hours in all — got emotional at times, with some teen students expressing fear about being the victims of gun violence and some gun rights advocates striking a defiant tone. Supporters of the bills said the measures will save lives in a culture enveloped in gun violence, while opponents said they violate the constitutional right to keep and bear arms and will not stop criminals who illegally access guns from committing gun violence.

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We are witnessing the mass memory-holing of the lockdown era.

I would prefer to refrain from using World War II analogies to discuss the Covid hysteria era, but it serves as the greatest modern parallel to the topic of accountability for all of the crimes, sabotage, and negligence committed by the people in charge in the name of combatting a virus.

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Say it’s 1946 in Berlin, and you were one of the few outspoken Germans who managed to make your dissident opinions heard while escaping the wrath of the Nazi regime. You were one of the few who made your way through the Holocaust and World War II with a clean moral slate, fighting The System every step of the way.

But you were a cup of courage in a sea of cowardice, and much worse. You just witnessed the vast majority of your countrymen either moving in lockstep with the bad guys or remaining silent in the face of the Third Reich’s systematic extermination campaign.

“Moral courage can be lonely indeed. People don’t mind being trapped, as long as no one else is free. But stage a break, and everybody else begins to panic.” – William Deresiewicz When I look back at the times of Covid hysteria, I think most about outliers and rule followers, and what separates courageous people from cowards.

Now that this horrific era has passed, you and your allies want accountability, and you want it now. In the aftermath of the bad times, German society seems to be realigning away from the immoral horrors, and the masses have openly embraced your worldview.

But unlike what actually happened after World War II, you’re still living in a German society without a denazification program, because the war didn’t end in the defeat of your ruling class. In fact, there has been no change in government whatsoever. The structure of the Bundeskabinett is virtually identical. The same people who were in charge during the times of evil and horror remain in place today, but they’re not nazis anymore. In fact, they now oppose nazism, they say. It’s clear that they don’t want to talk about those times.

How exactly would you intend on holding these people accountable?

Structurally speaking, that’s exactly where we find ourselves in America today. The very same ruling class that panicked the masses and instituted authoritarian dictates over the rebranded flu — which also proceeded to parasitically debase the wealth and prosperity of society — remain in charge today.

Very few, if any of the people in government today continue to defend the policies they put in place from 2020 to 2022. Some of them are indeed hooting and hollering about issues we’re all passionate about, but in a way that seeks to redirect attention away from their actions during this time.

They were complicit, or worse, actively undermining our rights when it mattered, and a true inquiry would drag those Covid skeletons out of the closet for the world to see. An accountability process wouldn’t just implicate the likes of Fauci and Pharma, but the entire system itself.

And it’s not just the ruling class that doesn’t want Covid accountability.

The ugly truth is that a vast majority of our fellow Americans embraced the hysteria, and many took to aligning with the people in charge to target and demonize the small minority who spoke out against the collective overreaction to the “pandemic.” This is an era that most would simply rather not relitigate. For both the people in the halls of power and most of the population, they benefit by both recalibrating their politics to the current majority view, but also by sweeping this multi-year disgrace under the rug.

We are witnessing the mass memory-holing of the lockdown era, which will allow for the bad guys to get away with it, because nobody seems to want to look in the mirror.

 Border Patrol Turns on Joe Biden, Proclaims Support for Texas National Guard.

Is there going to be a major confrontation on the border following Joe Biden’s ultimatum that Texas National Guard forces be removed from Shelby Park and other “disputed” areas? Not if the rank-and-file of the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol have anything to say about it.

According to a new post put out by the Border Patrol Union, and a new report from Griff Jenkins of Fox News, Biden has lost operational control of the situation, at least in a practical sense.

The Biden administration had initially warned Texas that it had until mid-day Friday to relinquish control of Shelby Park, the nearby boat dock, and the International Bridge. That deadline has now come and gone, and instead of there being a major clash between the Border Patrol and the state-controlled soldiers on site, it appears those on the ground have already de-escalated the situation.

The Border Patrol Union ends by slamming Biden for creating the current “catastrophe” and reiterating that there will be no conflict between CBP agents and state forces. The statement is a clear signal of support for the Texas National Guard, its mission, and those leading it, including Gov. Greg Abbott.

Rank-and-file BP agents appreciate and respect what TX has been doing to defend their state in the midst of this catastrophe that the Biden Admin has unleashed on America.

We want to be perfectly clear, there is no fight between rank-and-file BP agents and the TX NG, Gov. Abbott, or TX DPS. It may make flashy headlines, but it simply isn’t true.

Furthering the division between the Border Patrol and the White House was a senior CBP official who said they have no plans to follow through on removing the razor wire put up by Texas. Biden has completely lost whatever leverage he had.

This is an incredible turn of events. I don’t know if “mutiny” is the right word here, but clearly, Biden has no way to enforce his threats at this point. Border Patrol agents are not going to go along with it and short of using the Insurrection Act to mobilize the U.S. Army (and they likely wouldn’t act either), this represents a major roadblock to the president’s attempts to further destroy the Southern border.

We are in uncharted territory right now, and I’m certainly thankful cooler heads have prevailed, at least at this point. Will this force Biden’s hand toward some kind of renewal of enforcement of immigration laws? Surely, with his bluff having been called by his own law enforcement officials, he has to try a different approach. Never underestimate the propensity of Washington politicians to keep making the wrong decisions, though.

Would-be carjacking victim shoots, hospitalizes alleged attacker,

A would-be carjacking victim shot and hospitalized his alleged attacker in the Plum Orchard area early Friday morning, according to the New Orleans Police Department.

The man was driving in the 7300 block of Chef Menteur Highway when another man, later identified as 23-year-old Johnathan Edwards, approached his vehicle, pulled on the door handle and told him to get out, police said. The man instead opened fire, shooting Edwards several times.

The shooting was reported to police at 2:01 a.m. Paramedics transported Edwards to a hospital and a warrant was issued for his arrest.

Police did not immediately release more information.

Sen. Kennedy Humiliates Another Biden Nominee Who Can’t Answer a Simple Question.

The press seems to care more now that it’s demoncraps getting hit

Election cybersecurity director was a victim of a ‘swatting’ attack in her home.

The director of the Department of Homeland Security’s cybersecurity infrastructure protection agency confirms she was the victim of a dangerous “swatting” attempt late last month. As first reported on January 22 by cybersecurity news outlet, The Record, local police in Arlington County, VA, arrived at Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly’s residence around 9pm on December 30 after receiving a 911 call that falsely claimed a shooting had occurred in or near her home.

What is ‘swatting’?

“Swatting” refers to when malicious actors intentionally report nonexistent, often violent crimes at a target’s residence, with the intention of causing an aggressive, potentially harmful police response. The term originates in reference to the SWAT teams most often dispatched to handle the kinds of crimes reported by hoaxers. Although its origins reside in events such as simply calling in false bomb threats, swatting itself has grown in popularity over the years, initially through the online video gaming community. The FBI first referenced the “new phenomenon” as far back as 2008, but tactics have evolved since then to include more sophisticated methods such as hacking Ring cameras and employing “spoofing” technology to appear as though a 911 call is actually coming from a targeted residence. The technical complexity involved in Easterly’s incident is currently unclear.

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Analysis of New Mexico Gun Ban Bill Predicts Widespread Defiance

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s proposed ban on gas-operated semi-automatic firearms gets its first committee hearing today with the House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee set to consider HB 137, and the bill is already drawing some red flags from the New Mexico Attorney General’s office as well as the Law Offices of the Public Defender.

A fiscal impact report prepared by the Legislative Finance Committee released on Wednesday details some of the concerns over the bill, including the prediction from both the AG’s office and the Administrative Office of the Courts that the bill would be subject to a costly legal challenge if it’s signed into law. According to the Legislative Finance Committee, taxpayers can be expected to fork over almost half a million dollars for Attorney General Raul Torrez to defend the law in court, though it’s unclear if the LFC is  accounting for the cost of lawsuits filed in both federal and state court. In addition to the legal bills, the fiscal analysis estimates it will take at least $200,000 each year for the Attorney General to enforce the measure if it takes effect.

NMAG advises, to perform the tasks HB137 assigns to it, it will need highly specialized technical staff to ensure its listing of applicable weapons is up to date, given constant updates to firearms and accessories. It will require a ballistics and firearms expert on staff to handle its responsibilities under the act and to coordinate with DPS and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms and Explosives, at approximately $115 thousand per year, plus benefits, plus an investigator at approximately $85 thousand per year, plus benefits.

The Law Offices of the Public Defender (LOPD) expresses concern over potential widespread noncompliance should HB137 be enacted, leading to an unquantifiable increase in workload and expenses. LFC staff estimates this potential cost as indeterminate but minimal, which likely can be absorbed within its current budget.

While the public defender’s office may be able to absorb the cost of defending individuals charged with violating Grisham’s gun ban, the LFC predicts that the measure will also lead to a little more spending on incarceration if it’s enacted.

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OPINION: The true intent of the Democrats’ anti-militia bill is to infringe on firearm training
This bill paints a target on the back of every law-abiding gun owner.

As a law-abiding citizen of this great country, I can form my own militia if I so choose, appoint myself colonel, enlist my friends as privates or PFCs, and we can run around the woods until we all keel over from heatstroke or heart attacks — whatever comes first. It’s all perfectly legal, at least for now.

We have the right to criticize our government. We can sit around the campfire at our secret militia base nursing our sore muscles and fire ant bites and talk about how Joe walks like a penguin, or how it would take Kamala a good 20 minutes just to tell you you’re on fire. It’s all perfectly legal and protected speech, at least for now.

We have the right to train with our firearms. We can draw from a holster, shoot while moving, practice CQB and send as much lead downrange as our bank accounts will allow. It’s all perfectly legal conduct, at least for now.

However, a new bill making its way through Congress known as the “Preventing Private Paramilitary Activity Act of 2024,” would make all of this illegal or at least suspicious enough to draw scrutiny from the feds. More importantly, it would paint a target on the back of every single American gun owner, which is the actual intent of this ill-conceived and extremely unconstitutional legislation.

To be clear, if Joe Biden ever signs this bill, the second he puts down his crayon the feds will flock to local gun ranges in numbers that will make it nearly impossible for actual members to find a place just to park. This bill would give them license to investigate anyone who trains with a gun in order to determine whether they’re a militia member — and don’t think for a second that they won’t.

The FBI recently investigated law-abiding Americans whose sole transgression was shopping at a Cabela’s or a DICK’s Sporting Goods. Evidently, the FBI, the country’s so-called premier law enforcement agency, wasn’t aware DICK’s stopped selling guns and ammunition eons ago. Nowadays, the most dangerous thing on their shelves is a pickleball paddle.

When the Framers wrote the Second Amendment, militia membership was not only encouraged, it was required. All able-bodied men were instructed to own a firearm, powder and shot and to keep them clean and serviceable in the event they were ever needed. Now, under the guise that it might be militia-related, a handful of lawmakers are trying to criminalize firearm training — especially anything tactical. In my humble opinion, it is just another step toward their ultimate goal of total civilian disarmament.

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