{"id":79689,"date":"2022-04-07T17:36:24","date_gmt":"2022-04-07T22:36:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=79689"},"modified":"2022-04-07T17:37:03","modified_gmt":"2022-04-07T22:37:03","slug":"79689","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=79689","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

If You Can\u2019t Ban It, Overregulate It: Democrats War on Guns Continues<\/a><\/p>\n

In 2020, my husband and I took a concealed carry course at\u00a0Magnum Shooting Center<\/a>\u00a0in Colorado Springs. The class itself was approximately four hours and covered a number of topics related to gun ownership and safety. After the classroom instruction, we spent an hour on the range.<\/p>\n

What surprised me about this course was that a fair portion of it included instruction on Colorado laws, and specifically, what to do if I were ever in a situation when I needed to discharge my weapon (answer, get a lawyer).<\/p>\n

Indeed, even in cases of\u00a0clear self-defense<\/em>, legally owning a gun and using it to protect yourself can ruin you financially if the person you shot decides to come after you in court. What\u2019s more, this happens regularly. Someone shoots a would-be perpetrator in self-defense, and the\u00a0assailant turns around and presses charges<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If the above sounds outrageous to you, you\u2019re not alone. But, owning a gun and using it for protection is not as straightforward as you might think. That\u2019s because while Colorado Democrats in the General Assembly can\u2019t outright ban gun ownership thanks to the Second Amendment, they\u2019ve made fair progress toward making gun ownership impractical. And while Republicans are trying to safeguard Second Amendment rights, they\u2019re facing an uphill battle. Here\u2019s what just happened in the Colorado House of Representatives and why it matters to the overall picture of gun ownership.<\/p>\n

Restricting Constitutional Carry<\/b><\/p>\n

Colorado is currently considered an open carry state. That means if you\u2019re legally allowed to possess a firearm, you can open carry it as long as it\u2019s not in a restricted area. However, in 2021, Democratic lawmakers\u00a0successfully passed Senate Bill 21-256<\/a>, allowing local governments and municipalities the right to enact any gun law or regulation it wants, as long as that rule is not\u00a0less<\/em>\u00a0restrictive than current Colorado law.<\/p>\n

That means places like Boulder can now legally ban open carry of firearms even though open carry is legal under Colorado\u2019s state law. And indeed, that\u2019s what\u2019s happening. So far,\u00a0Denver is the only area to prohibit open carry<\/a>, but liberal places like Boulder will follow.<\/p>\n

In response to the above, Representative\u00a0Ron Hanks<\/a>\u00a0(Republican, D-60) introduced House Bill 22-1033, \u201cConstitutional Carry of a Handgun<\/a>.\u201d If it\u2019d passed, HB 1033 would allow anyone 21 years or older who is legally permitted to own a handgun, to also be permitted to carry that weapon concealed without a concealed carry permit. In other words, if you\u2019re 21 or older and you legally own a gun, you wouldn\u2019t have to attend a class and then get a permit to carry that gun under your jacket. More importantly, HB 1033 would\u2019ve repealed part of SB 256.\u00a0It stated<\/a>, \u201cThe bill repeals local government authority to regulate open or concealed carry of a handgun, including repealing the authority of special districts and the governing boards of institutions of higher education, as applicable.\u201d<\/p>\n

After Hanks introduced HB 1033 to the House, it was assigned to the House Committee on Public & Behavioral Health and Human Services. And on Feb. 8, after\u00a0less than three hours<\/a>\u00a0of deliberation, Democrats\u00a0voted to postpone HB 1033 indefinitely<\/a>\u00a0on a party-line vote.<\/p>\n

Republicans\u2019 Hands are Tied<\/strong><\/p>\n

Over the past year, The Maverick Observer has detailed how Democrats in the Colorado General Assembly have worked to increase barriers to gun ownership. And with recent bills like\u00a0HB 22-1086<\/a>\u00a0successfully making their way through the legislative process (link to be included once my article is published), 2022 will end with even more bureaucratic red tape. Make no mistake, the end goal is to overregulate guns into obscurity.<\/p>\n

Republican lawmakers like Hanks have tried to push back on these measures, but because Democrats make up a majority in both the House and Senate, and Colorado has a Democratic Governor, these efforts have almost zero chance of passing and are, essentially, dead on arrival.<\/p>\n

If the above concerns you, you can take a number of actions. First,\u00a0contact your representatives<\/a>\u00a0and tell them how you feel about the continued encroachments to your Second Amendment rights. Second,\u00a0sign up to testify<\/a>\u00a0either for or against bills making their way through the legislative process. And third \u2014 and arguably the only way to enact change given the current makeup in the General Assembly \u2014 vote in November for representatives who support the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If You Can\u2019t Ban It, Overregulate It: Democrats War on Guns Continues In 2020, my husband and I took a concealed carry course at\u00a0Magnum Shooting Center\u00a0in Colorado Springs. The class itself was approximately four hours and covered a number of topics related to gun ownership and safety. After the classroom instruction, we spent an hour … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-79689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-goobermint","category-rkba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=79689"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79689\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79690,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79689\/revisions\/79690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=79689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=79689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=79689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}