Interesting that the Oklahoma legisdlature ctually passed this crap-for-brains bill with this unintended? (or perhaps not so unintended) consequence<\/p>\n
VETOED BILL MIGHT HAVE FACILITATED GUN SEIZURES<\/a><\/p>\n When Gov. Kevin Stitt recently vetoed House 3501, proponents of the bill claimed it would have simply allowed state police to address individuals convicted by tribal courts of drunk driving and similar offenses.<\/p>\n But the broad language of the bill could have also required state police to carry out other orders issued by tribal courts, potentially including orders to seize guns from Oklahomans who \u201cannoy\u201d Cherokee officials with online posts, based on an existing Cherokee Nation law.<\/strong><\/p>\n That potential has grabbed the attention of Second Amendment supporters in Oklahoma.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re always concerned at any restriction of Second Amendment rights, which includes the exploitation of \u2018red flag\u2019 laws,\u201d said Don Spencer, president of the Oklahoma 2nd Amendment Association (OK2A).<\/p>\n House Bill 3501<\/a>\u00a0would have required the Department of Public Safety to \u201crecognize and act\u201d upon a report of conviction from any tribal court in Oklahoma.<\/p>\n Gov. Kevin Stitt\u00a0vetoed<\/a>\u00a0the bill, saying it would weaken the sovereignty of the Oklahoma state government. The governor noted the bill would have required state law-enforcement officials \u201cto carry out tribal court adjudications, no questions asked.\u201d<\/p>\n Supporters of the legislation said it would address traffic-law violators convicted in tribal courts. But the language of the bill is not restricted to only that class of tribal court orders, leaving open the possibility that Oklahoma law-enforcement officers would be required to carry out a much wider range of duties on behalf of tribal courts.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n That could have potentially included tribal court orders issued as a result of the \u201cAnti-Harassment Act of 2021<\/a>,\u201d which was enacted by the Cherokee council on June 14, 2021.<\/p>\n Under that tribal law, Cherokees who say they have suffered harassment may obtain a restraining order after a hearing. An anti-harassment protection order can be issued via an \u201cex parte\u201d process\u2014one in which action is taken without the presence of both parties\u2014and the order can be issued \u201cwithout notice.\u201d<\/p>\n When an order is issued, the Cherokee law says that the tribal court \u201cshall order the respondent to surrender, and prohibit the respondent from possessing, all firearms and any dangerous weapons.\u201d<\/p>\n The Cherokee law includes an expansive definition of \u201cunlawful harassment,\u201d which it says can include any conduct \u201cdirected at a specific person which seriously alarms, annoys, harasses, or is detrimental to such person.\u201d The law\u2019s definitions include electronic communications\u2014a category that can include social media posts or tweets\u2014as part of the \u201cpattern of conduct composed of a series of acts over time, however short,\u201d that may trigger the law\u2019s penalties.<\/p>\n Spencer said HB 3501 flew under the radar for many Oklahoma gun owners until Stitt vetoed it, but that officials with his organization are \u201cdefinitely\u201d concerned about the potential impact on citizens\u2019 gun rights if measures like HB 3501 become law.<\/p>\n Notably, if HB 3501 required officials with the Oklahoma Department of Public Safety to help tribal nations enforce their \u201cred flag\u201d gun laws, only Oklahomans of American Indian heritage would have been targeted, because state law bars officials from enforcing similar restrictions elsewhere.<\/p>\n In 2020, OK2A successfully lobbied for passage of legislation that bans state law enforcement from using federal funds in support of \u201cred flag\u201d laws that authorize seizure of citizens\u2019 weapons without conviction for a crime.<\/p>\n That 2020 legislation, Senate Bill 1081, created the \u201cAnti-Red Flag Act\u201d and prohibits state agencies and political subdivisions from \u201caccepting any grants or funding to implement any statute, rule or executive order, judicial order or judicial findings that would have the effect of forcing an extreme risk protection order against or upon a citizen of this state.\u201d The law defines an \u201cextreme risk protection order\u201d to include a \u201cwarrant issued by a court or signed by a magistrate or comparable officer of the court, for which the primary purpose is to reduce the risk of firearm-related death or injury\u201d by prohibiting an Oklahoman from \u201cowning, possessing or receiving a firearm\u201d or mandating that citizens \u201csurrender\u201d their firearms.<\/p>\n \u201cRed flag\u201d laws typically allow government officials to seize weapons from individuals alleged to be a danger to others, but who have not been arrested for or convicted of any crime. Opponents of \u201cred flag\u201d laws say they deprive citizens of their basic constitutional rights.<\/p>\n A 2020\u00a0review<\/a>\u00a0by the Rand Corporation found that no qualifying studies showed extreme risk protection orders decreased any of the eight outcomes reviewed, including violent crime, unintentional death, mass shootings, and suicide.<\/p>\n Jacob Sullum, senior editor at the libertarian\u00a0Reason<\/em>\u00a0magazine, has written often about \u201cred flag\u201d laws and\u00a0noted<\/a>, \u201cWithout adequate safeguards, respondents can lose their constitutional rights based on little more than an aggrieved individual\u2019s unverified assertions.\u201d<\/p>\n State Sen. Nathan Dahm, R-Broken Arrow, authored Oklahoma\u2019s \u201cAnti-Red Flag Act.\u201d He also opposed HB 3501, although Dahm said he was unaware of the Cherokee \u201cAnti-Harassment Act\u201d when he cast his vote of opposition. However, Dahm said he was concerned that HB 3501 could force Oklahoma law-enforcement officials to assist in tribal efforts that might not pass muster under state law.<\/p>\n \u201cI wasn\u2019t aware of that, in particular, but that was my concern was that there could be some of those types of things by giving that jurisdiction over,\u201d Dahm said.<\/p>\n Following Stitt\u2019s veto of HB 3501, the Inter-Tribal Council of the Five Civilized Tribes\u2014a group that includes the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Muscogee (Creek), and Seminole nations\u2014issued a brief\u00a0statement<\/a>\u00a0calling for lawmakers to override Stitt\u2019s veto.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Interesting that the Oklahoma legisdlature ctually passed this crap-for-brains bill with this unintended? (or perhaps not so unintended) consequence VETOED BILL MIGHT HAVE FACILITATED GUN SEIZURES When Gov. Kevin Stitt recently vetoed House 3501, proponents of the bill claimed it would have simply allowed state police to address individuals convicted by tribal courts of drunk … 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],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-goobermint"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81045","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=81045"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81045\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81046,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81045\/revisions\/81046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=81045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=81045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=81045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}