We Don’t Want to Be Paris!

By Jeff Knox

(November 19, 2015) By now, we’ve all heard about the atrocities in Paris; Islamist terrorists driving through the streets randomly shooting people, Islamist terrorists wrapping themselves in explosives and nuts and bolts, and blowing themselves and innocents apart, Islamist terrorists strolling into a crowded music venue and opening fire with automatic weapons, killing dozens and injuring hundreds.  It’s an outrage.  It’s a travesty.  It’s a perversion of religion.  And it’s coming to America.  Soon.

We’ve already seen some of this, but we don’t have high concentrations of “radicalized” Muslims here like they do in France and most of Europe.  We also don’t have their strict gun control laws.

That last point is worth further consideration.  Did strict gun control laws in France serve to mitigate the terrorists’ actions?  Or did they empower the terrorists?  If terrorists there could easily purchase semi-auto firearms – or have their wives or girlfriends buy them – as they can here in the U.S., would that have resulted in more attacks by more terrorists with a greater loss of life?  When (not if) it happens here, I’m certain we’ll hear that assertion from the usual quarters.

Acts of terrorism are rarely spur-of-the-moment things.  Even acts by madmen or “lone wolf” terrorists have been planned out well in advance, with weapons acquisition, target selection, and timing all thought through.

Continue reading Not in Paris, Texas →

Senseless in Seattle

By Jeff Knox

(November 12, 2015) The city of Seattle, Washington passed an ordinance this summer that imposes a $25 tax on every gun sold in the city, and 5 cents on each round of ammunition except .22 caliber and smaller, which will carry a tax of 2 cents per round.  Not only is the law senseless, it’s a huge waste of taxpayers’ money, and it’s patently illegal.  The Second Amendment Foundation, based just outside of Seattle, has already filed suit, along with the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the National Rifle Association, two Seattle gun stores, and a pair of local residents to block the city’s action.  This is not the first time SAF has taken Seattle to court.  Just a few years ago SAF had to sue to block an ordinance banning legal guns in city parks.  They won that suit, and it is very likely that they and their co-plaintiffs will win this new one as well, because the state has a long-standing preemption law that is very clear and unequivocal.  It says that regulation of firearms is the exclusive purview of the State Legislature, and any law, ordinance, or regulation that is firearm-related must go through that body.

Seattle’s latest attempted work-around is to claim that they are no regulating firearms or ammunition, merely taxing them under their normal taxing authority.  Courts all over the country have repeatedly rejected this sort of pedantic claim, noting that the operative result of the law, and indeed its openly stated intent, is to limit and impact the purchase and ownership of firearms and ammunition.  Even if these taxes were strictly intended as revenue generators, they would still be in violation of the preemption law.  But since the tax is billed as a “public safety” measure, there is no basis whatsoever for the claim that it is not intended to infringe on the legislature’s exclusive firearm territory.

Continue reading Senseless in Seattle →

Guns Win

By Jeff Knox

(November 5, 2015) As this column reported a few weeks ago, the Democrats are betting big on gun control for this election cycle.  That’s good news for GunVoters, that minority of us who, while perhaps not being one-issue voters, don’t trust a politician who doesn’t trust us with a gun.  Republicans, however, seem oblivious to the opportunity.

For the past 20 years, Democrats have tiptoed around the gun issue, with only an occasional surge in rhetoric after some highly-publicized atrocity, but only after hedging their bets and voting cautiously lest they upset the GunVoters back home.  For most of those 20 years, there has been a steady drumbeat from the professional gun control lobby and their media friends, denouncing the Democrats’ avoidance of the issue as unfounded paranoia based on false assumptions.  A 2009 editorial from the New York Times, which relied heavily on expert opinions from the gun control lobbyists at the Brady Campaign, is a great example.  It called the fear of offending GunVoters a “deadly myth,” and dismissed GunVoters’ role in the Republican Revolution of 1994 and the defeat of Al Gore in 2000.  They pointed to the election of Barack Obama, and pro-gun losses in various House and Senate races as proof that the NRA is overrated.

They’re certainly right that the NRA is overrated, but the reality isn’t as simple as they paint it.  NRA is overrated because people who don’t understand the issue, including the Times editorial board, and a majority of politicians on both sides of the aisle, think NRA is “the Gun Lobby.”  That’s simply not true.  The gun lobby is much bigger than just the NRA, and it’s much more complex than just one organization, its positions, and its leaders.  While the NRA is the big dog of the gun rights movement, it is a mistake to think that they are the end all and be all of that movement.  Likewise, it is a myth to think that an NRA endorsement or NRA opposition is all that matters to GunVoters.

Continue reading Guns Win →

Silencers Finally Making Noise

By Jeff Knox

(October 29, 2015) For over a decade The Firearms Coalition has been calling for removal of the ridiculous federal restrictions on firearms mufflers, commonly referred to as suppressors or silencers.  Back in 2006 and 2007 we were actively working with the office of Senator Larry Craig (R-ID) on legislation to remove silencers from the restrictions of the National Firearms Act, but those efforts were sidelined by Senator Craig’s personal problems.  Since then, an entire organization dedicated to this objective, the American Suppressor Association, has come into being, and now Representative Matt Salmon (R-AZ) has announced the introduction of new legislation, H.R.3799, to remove silencers from the NFA and treat them like firearms.

While we’d rather see silencers completely deregulated, moving them from the NFA to the Gun Control Act, or GCA, would be a significant improvement.  The idea that you can get a ticket for not having an effective muffler on your car or motorcycle, but can be sentenced to 10 years in prison and subject to a $10,000 fine for having any sort of noise reducer for a firearm, is beyond ridiculous.  But that has been the standard since passage of the 1934 National Firearms Act.  Under the NFA, any device that muffles or reduces the sound made by a gun is highly regulated, taxed, and controlled.  Silencers, as they are broadly referred to under the law, are generally nothing more than a metal tube with some baffles or washers in it to slow and redirect hot gasses, but they are considered firearms under the NFA, and subject to the same taxes and restrictions as fully automatic weapons.  

It doesn’t matter whether the muffler is attached to a firearm or not, or even if you have no firearm to attach it to.  Worse yet, the restrictions on silencers are even more expansive than those on machine guns.  While only the actual receiver, and a few very specific parts, of a machine gun are subject to restrictions, every part or piece of a silencer is illegal to possess unless it is properly registered, taxed, and accompanied by the proper paperwork.  The broad application has led to some bizarre rulings by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), which has gone so far as to state that possession of steel wool scouring pads is a violation of the Act since the steel wool could be used as  baffling in a silencer.  They have also declared that plastic noise dissipaters integrated into air rifles and BB guns – which would be destroyed by hot gasses from an actual firearm – are silencers under the law and require registration and payment of the $200 tax.  Recently, the ATF decreed that certain muzzle brakes, which help reduce recoil and muzzle jump when firing, must be registered as silencers, even though these devices actually increase the gun’s noise levels around the shooter.  ATF says the construction of the devices is too similar to the internal construction of a silencer.

Continue reading Silencers Finally Making Noise →

Dangerous Disorder in the Court

By Jeff Knox

(October 20, 2015) The Federal Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has once again come down with a shameful ruling based on selective interpretation of the Supreme Court’s narrow rulings in Heller and McDonald, the landmark Second Amendment cases decided in 2008 and 2010.  In this latest abomination from the courts, the three-judge panel concluded that New York and Connecticut’s laws banning virtually all semi-auto rifles as “assault weapons” and all “high-capacity” magazines, do indeed “burden” and infringe on citizens’ rights under the Second Amendment, but they go on to conclude that the states’ “compelling governmental interest in public safety and crime prevention” carry greater weight than individuals’ rights to self-defense – in spite of the fact that “assault weapons” are rarely used in crime, when they are, it is unusual for more than a few shots to be fired, and laws restricting them and “high-capacity” magazines have proven useless in practical application.  Conspicuously missing from the court’s reasoning was any reference to the militia or to the previous, primary Supreme Court ruling on the Second Amendment, US v. Miller. 

The Second Amendment is composed of two clauses, the prefatory clause; “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state,” and the operative clause “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”  In Miller, the Court commented that this militia relationship had to be considered in any judgement regarding the right to arms.  They went on to conclude that, since they weren’t aware of a short-barreled shotgun being a normal part of militia equipment, that such an arm was not protected under the Second Amendment.

Continue reading Dangerous Disorder in the Court →

We Don’t Carry for You

By Jeff Knox

Like many Americans, I frequently carry a gun.  I’ve done so for over 30 years without ever laying hand to it in need.  Professor John Lott of the Crime Prevention Research Center reports that some 12.8 million people, over 5.2% of the adult U.S. population, are licensed to carry a concealed handgun.  In addition to concealed carry license holders in all 50 states, 7 states require no permit at all for concealed carry, and 40 states have few restrictions on carrying as long as the gun is visible.  On top of that, as I have reported recently, there appears to be a growing trend among people who routinely carry a firearm to also routinely ignore signs that tell them they can’t.  It is a growing form of civil disobedience that puts no one at increased risk of death or injury.  As the number of concealed carriers grows, violent crime continues to fall.  This doesn’t prove that more guns equals less crime, but it irrefutably proves that more guns do not equate to more crime. 

Unless you live in one of the extremely restrictive states like New York, New Jersey, or Massachusetts, any time you are on the street or anywhere that does not have controlled access, with metal detectors and bag searches, etc., there is a fairly high probability that someone nearby is legally carrying a gun.  But they are not carrying that gun to protect you.

A popular essay from Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, divided humans into three categories: “Sheep,” “Wolves,” and “Sheepdogs.”  I would suggest that Lt. Col. Grossman left out an important fourth category: “Porcupines.”

Continue reading I’m Not Your Sheepdog →

Democrats Big Bet on Gun Control

Never urinate on the third rail.

By Jeff Knox

(October 7, 2015) The shooting at Umqua Community College in Roseberg, Oregon last week, and its immediate politicization by President Obama, has revived gun control as a key issue among presidential candidates.  Shannon Watts, the public relations executive who runs Mike Bloomberg’s anti-rights subsidiary, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, told ABC News; “This is really a sea change in terms of how presidential candidates are talking about this, where they would not have in the past.”

“This is a big deal,” she said, “It was the third-rail of politics.”

Watts is right, this is a big deal, and what it’s doing is re-energizing that “third rail” which has been powered down somewhat for the past several years by a combination of duplicity and incompetence; duplicity on the part of anti-rights politicians who have actively moderated their rhetoric about gun control, and incompetence on the part of Republican leadership in pushing candidates who do not truly respect our right to arms.  The result has been fewer obvious and vulnerable targets for GunVoters to actively oppose, and fewer solid pro-rights candidates for GunVoters to actively support.  In short, by not having the issue prominently debated as a clear dividing factor between candidates, and not having threats to rights coming through loud and clear, GunVoters have had little to get excited about during electoral campaigns.  Now things have changed, and Democrat rhetoric is powering up the “third rail” like never before.

What’s astounding is that in their zeal to position themselves as the most aggressive on gun control, the candidates are parroting a litany of proposals that poll well among their base, but are conceived in ignorance.  Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland, has distinguished himself as the leader in this category with calls to end “internet sales” and require that all firearm transactions be conducted in person.  This might seem reasonable if not for the fact that such a law was enacted in 1968.  While the internet didn’t exist then, catalog sales were very popular, and as part of the Gun Control act of 1968 Congress adopted laws requiring that all firearms transfers, with the exception of business-to-business transfers between licensed dealers, manufacturers, and importers, be conducted in face-to-face transactions.

O’Malley also wants to create a national firearms registry, something gun owners have vehemently opposed for decades, and that has been proven to be both useless for crime prevention, and ridiculously expensive.  It is also something that has proven to be impossible in Connecticut and New York, where they passed limited registration laws after the tragedy at Sandy Hook.

All three of the leading Democrat candidates are calling for a new ban on “assault weapons,” even though the original Clinton gun ban proved, after ten years, to be nothing more than an expensive symbolic gesture, and a stimulus package for gun sales. They are all also advocating expanding background checks as a way to prevent mass murders, but they seem ignorant of the fact that the murderers they hold up as proof of the need, almost all passed background checks to get their guns. 

Clinton and O’Malley say they want to repeal the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which dismisses lawsuits against gun manufacturers and dealers for the criminal actions of people who misuse their lawful products.  And Clinton is even promising to bypass Congress and enact firearms restrictions by executive fiat, as Obama has done to some degree, and as Bloomberg’s group, Everytown for Gin Safety has been advocating.

Some of the Republican candidates have endorsed some of these gun control ideas in the past, but none of them are publicly advocating them now, at least not nearly to the extent the Democrats are, and even the Democrats are not willing to endorse the more draconian demands of the professional anti-rights organizations.

Now Senate Democrats have introduced a new set of the same old flawed gun control proposals, so GunVoters will also have some clear and current activity with which to judge congressional candidates next year as well.  If pro-rights members of Congress are smart, they will answer Harry Reid and company with demands for record votes on pro-rights legislation like S.498/H.R.923, the Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act sponsored by Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-IN), and H.R.2710, the Lawful Purpose and Self Defense Act sponsored by Rep. Rob Bishop (R-UT).  Doing so would provide GunVoters with further proof of who is, and is not on our side.

By boldly promising to go after the nation’s 80 to 100 million innocent gun owners instead of the violent criminals who misuse guns, the Democrats are kicking the GunVoter hornets’ nest and super-charging the “third rail” they have avoided for so long.  I, for one, welcome their new, more open approach, because I believe that it will result in some really shocking consequences that will benefit gun owners – and the Republic – in the long run.

Unless Republicans really drop the ball over the next 12 months, the refrain from Democrats on November 9, 2016 should be; “We didn’t know it was loaded.”

Gun Rights Gathering

By Chris Knox

Phoenix, Arizona, the capitol city of arguably the most “gun-friendly” state in the nation, played host last week to the country’s largest annual gathering of organizations and individuals committed to defense of the Second Amendment: the 30^th Annual Gun Rights Policy Conference.  As brother Jeff mentioned in his presentation, somebody named Knox has spoken at almost every one of these conferences for the past 30 years, beginning with our father, Neal Knox, at the first one in 1985.  Jeff joined Dad on the speaker roster 10 years later, and I have been honored to present or serve in other capacities in recent years.

One highlight of this year’s event was when Republican presidential candidate, former Virginia Governor Jim Gilmore, addressed the crowd during the luncheon.  Governor Gilmore spent the whole morning at the conference, listening to presentations and mingling with attendees in the front hall.  What’s particularly noteworthy about this is that there were no uniformed police or security guards to be found anywhere around the conference, aside from the regular hotel guys, but there were hundreds of armed citizens, some carrying openly, some carrying discreetly.  Arizona is a “Constitutional Carry” state, meaning that anyone who is not prohibited from possessing a gun is free to carry it, openly or concealed, just about anywhere they choose, no license, permit, or government permission slip required.  Hundreds of the GRPC attendees were freely exercising that right, and it was refreshing to see this candidate for President of the United States standing in their midst shaking hands and chatting with strangers who had Glocks, Kimbers, and Colts visible on their hips.

Sponsored by the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms and its sister organization the Second Amendment Foundation, the conference is a great event that has earned significant stature within the rights movement.  Even though the Internet has sped up the communication of ideas, there’s nothing like getting face-to-face with other activists to build rapport and cooperation.  It is an energizing exercise in using the First Amendment to defend the Second, and anyone involved or interested in this fight should make it a point to attend.  The GRPC is held every year in a different city during the last weekend in September.  Next year’s event will be held in Tampa, Florida.

In addition to being a networking, idea sharing, and cross-pollination venue, GRPC is also an opportunity to take the temperature of the movement.  It’s an opportunity not only to hear what people and organizations from around the country have to say, but also to see who they are and what they do, and to meet and chat with the real “gun lobby,” the guys who pay their membership dues, write the $20 checks, work the recruiting and information booths at gun shows, and take their neighbors out to the range.  Unlike the Astroturf activists hired or created by Mike Bloomberg and the Brady Bunch, the “gun lobby” is a true grassroots movement made up of millions of dedicated volunteers.  Even most of the leaders of the movement are volunteers who do their lobbying and organizing on a part-time basis during their off-hours from regular jobs.  Among those who do get a paycheck, most, including brother Jeff, are earning well below their potential because they are deeply committed to the cause.

There was little evidence of the much-reviled “corporate gun lobby” at the event.  While the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the trade association for the industry, sent a speaker, as did the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute, and some companies helped underwrite the event by sponsoring coffee and snacks, no one could realistically accuse the gathering of shilling for the gun industry.  Alan Gottlieb, founder and President of SAF and CCRKBA respectively, and Larry Pratt, Executive Director of Gun Owners of America, both spoke and were well-received, but the National Rifle Association, which was a regular participant in the conference for its first two decades, had no official presence this year.  NRA has tended to skip the conference completely in recent years amid criticism from attendees about what they considered NRA’s wishy-washy approach.  Those who think NRA is hard-line have never been to a GRPC.

Another group that was conspicuous by their absence was the National Association for Gun Rights, or NAGR.  This organization has been frustrating rights activists for the past decade with their heavy, direct mail, “the sky is falling” fundraising tactics, raising millions of dollars from gun owners, while doing little of note in the actual fight.  Several of the more than 70 presenters at the conference took an opportunity to take a swipe at the group, and those jabs received applause from the attendees

Finally, it’s worth mentioning another absence at this year’s GRPC.  Absent was the idea of “preemptive concession.”  Last year’s GRPC exposed a significant divide between Second Amendment supporters, some of whom suggested that we couldn’t win fights against state-level bans on private firearm transfers, and should therefore get a seat at the table to have some say in the crafting of the inevitable legislation.  Others (brother Jeff and myself included) saw that approach as an abandonment of principle.  As our late father, Neal Knox often said, “Never give away what the other side is not big enough to take.”  The controversy was reported in the lamestream media as though fistfights had broken out during the GRPC, when in reality, it was a civil, if sometimes heated discussion among friends.  There was none of that at this year’s conference.  The unifying strategy is to meet force with force, and if we lose, to make cost the other side enough that they think twice before “winning” again.

In 2015 with a presidential election and disturbing ballot initiatives to criminalize person-to-person firearm transfers in several states pending, serious concerns remain, but the GRPC as a body presented a remarkably united front. Hopefully as we continue to 2016, the gun rights movement will be able to capitalize on this unity.

Is Trump the GunVoter Pick?  

By Jeff Knox

(September 22, 2015) As early jockeying in the Republican Presidential Primary competition heats up, front-runner Donald Trump recently made big points with GunVoters by releasing a detailed manifesto declaring his support for the Second Amendment.  The statement is clear and unequivocal, unlike the mushy “I support the Second Amendment” sort of statement we so often hear from candidates, particularly northeastern Republicans.  The Trump statement declares opposition to any new or expanded gun control laws, supports proposals for national recognition of concealed carry licenses, and calls for enforcement and prosecution of existing laws.  It could have been written by someone at the NRA.

Trump’s clear statement has been well received by supporters of gun rights, but before we all rush out to get “Trump for President” yard signs for our lawns, let’s look at what else Mr. trump has said about guns and gun control.

In his brief foray into presidential politics in 2000, Mr. Trump also expressed strong support for the Second Amendment, then backtracked offering caveats like support for expanded “background checks,” waiting periods, and banning so-called “assault weapons.”  Those aren’t positions that serious GunVoters can get behind.

Perhaps Mr. Trump did some research on Second Amendment issues in the years since taking those positions, and has come to a more principled understanding of the issues.  That is always a possibility, and I would never criticize someone seeking a position of trust for educating himself and revising a position based on what he learned.  On the other hand, there is the real possibility that Donald Trump is simply pandering to GunVoters for purely political reasons.  It is well known that GunVoters can be a powerful political constituency, and Trump is a master at providing red meat for special interest groups. 

The big problem is that we have no record on which to judge Mr. Trump.  He has never held political office, has never been a major contributor to pro-rights efforts, and has never used his power and influence to advance the debate on rights issues.  While he has long held one of the few concealed handgun permits doled out by the city of New York, and we have seen photos of his sons on trophy hunts in Africa, we have never seen any substantive action from Trump in support of gun rights for average citizens.  In short, we have nothing but his statements – which have changed over the years – upon which to judge him.  That’s not all that reassuring.  The fact that his position statement so closely follows the talking points of the NRA – a group that Trump specifically singled out as having undue influence on other candidates during the 2000 campaign – should also raise some red flags.  Anyone can go to the NRA website or look at their candidate questionnaire and copy their positions.  What assurance do we have that these are Mr. Trump’s actual beliefs, or that his position won’t shift again when tested by some future calamity?

While Trump has been getting major exposure, both from traditional and social media, many of the other candidates in the Republican field have taken similar positions on gun rights, and some of them actually have records to back up their statements.

We all know that politicians have a propensity to pander.  And we also know how Joe Average Gunowner loves to be pandered to.  It’s part of the nature of the game.  What we GunVoters – educated gun-owning voters who understand Second Amendment issues – need to do is gauge their sincerity and commitment to given issues, and lend our support and votes accordingly.  It’s still very early in the Presidential Primary process, so there is plenty of time to carefully evaluate the candidates and dig deeper into their statements, their records, and their attitudes.  At this point Trump has the momentum, and it could be enough to carry him through to win the primaries, or it could wane as some other candidate surges to the front.  The one thing we should not do is commit to any candidate without thoroughly vetting them first, and giving full consideration to their opponents as well.

That’s one of the reasons we created GunVoter.org several years ago, to give candidates, their supporters, and their detractors a venue to share information about firearm-related issues with voters concerned about those issues.  GunVoter.org is a user-driven, forum site where anyone is welcome to post information about their favorite candidate, or ask questions about any candidate’s position, statements, or record regarding firearm-related issues.  While site administrators and moderators make some effort to gather information about candidates, it is the users and forum members who must drive the discussions and provide the bulk of the information.

If you are interested in participating in this voter education experiment, I’d like to personally invite you to visit GunVoter.org and join the discussion.  Registering for the site will not sign you up for emails or advertisements, and your privacy is always assured.

Picking a President, or any other elected office, is a big responsibility.  Be sure you’re armed with the knowledge to make wise decisions, and that you share your knowledge with fellow voters who need to know.  GunVoter.org is a way to do that.  I hope we’ll see you there, so together we can identify and back the best candidates in the coming elections.

Tim Kaine is a Liar

By Jeff Knox

(September 17, 2015) Speaking to a group of dozens of supporters of Mike Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety last week, Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) said; “The voice against background records checks isn’t the voice really that’s just about background records checks,” he said. “I mean, it is largely fueled by gun manufacturers and funded by gun manufacturers who basically have one policy. And that’s sell as many weapons to whoever you can, whenever you can, wherever you can, in whatever frequency you can.”

That statement is a lie. 

It’s not even an artful lie.  It has built-in absurdities that won’t stand up to the simplest questioning.  For example, how do gun manufacturers benefit from a robust legal market in used guns? 

Not only is it a lie, Kaine’s statement is an insult to anyone who doesn’t buy the lie.  He intentionally misleads people regarding the actual reach and impact of proposals that he is broadly referring to as “background records checks.”  He also implies that these records checks are not currently being conducted.  That is a lie.

Let’s get some things straight:

●     A “background check” is required on every purchase of every firearm from every federally licensed gun dealer in the country, including Virginia.

●     It is a federal felony to “engage in the business of buying and selling firearms” without a Federal Firearms License, but just as you can sell your car without being a car dealer, an individual can occasionally sell a gun without being a gun dealer.

●     It is a federal felony for anyone who is prohibited from purchasing or possessing a firearm to buy or attempt to buy a gun.

●     It is a federal felony for anyone to sell a gun to anyone that they “know or suspect” to be a “prohibited possessor.”

●     The Roanoke murderer who shot the TV reporter bought his gun from a licensed dealer and passed a federally mandated background check.  So did the terrorist who shot the Marines and sailor in Chattanooga, and the guy who shot Gabby Giffords, and the guy who murdered the people at Emanuel AME Church, and just about every other high-profile murderer in the past 20 years.  None of the current proposals would have prevented any of these tragedies.

●     The gun control laws being pushed by Kaine and Bloomberg are much broader and more invasive than they claim and would make criminals out of ordinary Americans.

●     The current “background check” law was advanced and promoted by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the trade group of the firearms industry, and by the NRA.

●     To this day, the NSSF and the NRA actively support the current federal laws listed above and actively lobby in favor of legislation to encourage or compel states to provide more records – particularly mental health records – of their citizens, and enhance the scope and accuracy of all of the system’s records.

I disagree with NSSF and NRA’s position because I believe the background check system is a huge, wasteful bureaucracy that burns taxpayer money and resources to violate the constitutionally guaranteed rights of Americans.  But to suggest that firearm manufacturers are funding or driving opposition to expanding the system is patently false.  If it weren’t for fear of backlash from their customer base, many manufacturers would undoubtedly push for even stricter laws as a way to dry up the used firearm trade so consumers would buy more of the manufacturers’ new guns. Though few would admit it today, many of our nation’s current gun laws and regulations originated as protectionist programs to shield the industry from foreign, and especially military surplus competition.

Senator Kaine’s comments were delivered to a small group of supporters of Mike Bloomberg’s gun control conglomerate, Everytown for Gun Safety.  The group had promised to “flood the U.S. Capitol grounds” with their protesters, but the nation’s largest and wealthiest gun control mega-corp could muster, at best, a few hundred people, along with a bunch of politicians and a large turnout of media for their dog and pony show. 

Senator Kaine was joined at the event by fellow Virginia senator Mark Warner, and Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe, along with family members of victims and survivors of “gun violence.”  Using emotion and hyperbolic rhetoric, the speakers pushed for support of Bloomberg’s main goal these days, criminalization of private firearm transfers.

Note that I used the word “transfers,” not “sales.”  While sales are encompassed by the broader term “transfers,” the proposals are not limited only to sales, but include any transfer of a firearm from one person to another, including loans, gifts, and even simply letting someone else handle a gun momentarily.  This is one of the big lies of the battle over “universal background checks,” the implication that the proposals only deal with sales.

Senator Kaine wants to take the unconstitutional intrusions even further, and has introduced legislation to not only force private gun buyers and sellers to pay a fee, fill out federal paperwork, and conduct the transaction through a federally licensed dealer, he also wants to assign liability to the seller for any subsequent crime committed with a gun they sold.  This would put all gun dealers and anyone who ever sold a personal firearm at serious risk of crippling litigation.

Senator Kaine and the rest of Bloomberg’s minions will continue to double-down on the “universal background check” lie.  The lie needs to be called out every time it comes up. 

Second Amendment defenders can directly counter the Bloomberg blitz with calls to our elected servants in Congress.  Point out that “universal background checks” are neither universal, nor are they real background checks.  Point out the risk of turning ordinary, innocent people into felons when they sell, give, or even loan a gun to a friend.  The lie also needs to be called out in public forums, including letters to the editor, and in social media. 

Don’t buy the lie, and don’t let your friends be deceived.