Broadly speaking, rank and file police in America support gun rights. After all, beat cops know a good guy with a gun might someday save their life, too. On the other hand, police administrators largely toe the line of their political bosses.
Big Democrat-run cities or university towns too often have top cops dedicated to furthering the cause of gun control. They have to in order to keep their paychecks coming.
In some cases, such as Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez (pictured above), about the only thing people can do is vote them out of office.
Recently, to prove her anti-2A bona fides, Valdez lent her name to Gabby Giffords’ Americans for Responsible Solutions. Seems Ms. Valdez opposes national reciprocity.
In other cases, such as Chicago’s top cop who’s accountable only to the Mayor, the little people have little influence over them. Well, aside from holding them up to ridicule for their failure to reign in crime.
Don’t despair though. We still have options.
In America, police chiefs love to form their own little organizations. Those orgs acts as their collective mouthpiece, often in support of gun control.
Gabby Giffords’ Americans for Responsible Solutions likes to tout as much. “Major law enforcement organizations unanimously oppose federally mandated concealed carry.” Her group then posts the seals from a number of cop groups.
Included in those groups: The Police Foundation, The Police Executive Research Forum, The Hispanic-American Police Command Officers Association, The International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators, The International Association of Chiefs of Police, the Major Cities Chiefs Police Association among others.
How can you influence these groups? Easy. Cut off their funding. Don’t donate to them.
For decades, police and fire fundraisers have drawn all manner of unscrupulous people. These folks prey on the widespread support of public safety organizations. While most law enforcement fundraisers are legitimate and laudable, many are not. Some of these fundraisers don’t even net their charitable organization sponsors pennies on the dollar.
Others are outright scam. Pervasive problems in the fundraising industry has even caused the Federal Trade Commission to include consumer information on their website about police and fire charitable calls.
When you get a mass mail fundraising solicitation from one of these gun-hating groups, don’t just throw it in the trash. Instead, mail it back in the postage paid envelope with a note letting them know that you won’t be donating and why.
When you get a telephone solicitation from a representative of these anti-gun groups, don’t just hang up. If you’ve downloaded the free Mr. Number app on your phone, you can report the number to Mr. Number as a telemarketing call.
That will block calls from that number for you and other Mr. Number app users. Blocked calls can’t raise money for these police groups, crippling their ability to raise funds.
Less money means reduced ability to influence public opinion.
Gun rights advocacy takes many forms. Denying funding to anti-gun rights police groups costs you nothing, and it deprives them of the life blood they need to continue their misguided work.That, ladies and gentlemen, is a job well done.
Better yet, ban police from unionizing and spreading political opinions in their official capacity. They want to act like they are not civilians? Fine. Put them under the UCMJ.
Agreed.
No cop should go to lobby for anti 2A bills under their official title or uniform.
You miss my point. Treat them exactly like the military.
– no unions
– no right to free speech
– no legal recourse against most administrative punishments
– all service for a fixed term
Etc… they want to run around like they aren’t civilians… fine… let’s give them the full military green weenie experience.
“…they want to run around like they aren’t civilians… fine… let’s give them the full military green weenie experience.”
LOL, and ew.
There would be a lot of very unhappy people demoted to the rank of patrolman or whatever their LEA calls such a rank.
But, we could make them pick up litter, that would be a plus.
As someone with military and LE experience actually agree with you, in theory, however it’s not possible because that would totally violate posse comitatus. Also, I think many of you would severely dislike the immunity from civil law and lawsuits that officers would get, as that would have to entail them to be in a state of marshal law. Look at it this way, your town goes full ferguson and the military has to stomp it out. People approaching soldiers at a chech point will get likely only ONE command to stop before they are perforated. In the process of this conflict, let’s say they mistakenly JADAM your house. (Assuming your not in it at the time and survive) You’d have no ability to sue the military or ever see any of its members punished for the act. That’s what policing would be like if it were to morph into a segment of the military.
I didn’t say incorporate them into the military, I said put them under military discipline. Big difference. So no constittuional issues are involved.
Quite frankly, the police get quite a bit of power and very little actual accountability to go with it. That needs to change. If a Marine loses his rifle stateside, he’s drawing a full court and probably going to club fed. If a patrolman looses his issue rifle, he gets a paid vacation.
I don’t know what department would do that, but I know for a fact that in mine if I lost a weapon I’d be fired on the spot. Then again my department isn’t in a democrat/union state,so I suppose up there it’s possible. Where I am the police unions are a joke and no one really joins them. They of course still have some political pull but nothing like how I see it reported here. But that’s the big difference between blue union states and red right to work states.
Hank,
Your department would fire you if you, say had a weapon in a car parked in front of your house and it went missing due to obvious theft?
A weapon in a car, or an issued weapon. Yes, I would definitely be fired for letting my issued weapon be stolen, or lost. A personal weapon no, it would be treated like any other person having a weapon stolen.
Hank,
I just ask because I have a ton of LE in my neighborhood and a number of local and county LEO’s and even a fed have all lost a weapon to theft this way (all in the same night actually when pretty much every car in the area got hit) and none of them were fired.
The Sheriff’s folks were reprimanded but the rest were treated as if they were just simple victims and one lost a legit M4 (that, along with most of the rest were recovered a couple days later, but still).
That’s pretty wild. Things like that can come down to individual department policy and your locale. Never had anything like that happen here, but it’s been made very clear where I work that you don’t leave weapons in a/your vehicle overnight.
Hank, to my point, you’d be fired, not thrown in jail. The way I see it, cops who lose duty weapons due to incompetence need to go to jail.
Getting fired is bad, but it’s not several years in Leavenworth and a federal felony record as a parting party favor.
Hank: “that would totally violate posse comitatus”
Pwrserge: “So no constitutional issues are involved.”
The Posse Comitatus Act is an act of Congress. Using the military to enforce the law doesn’t violate any constitutional principal if Congress were to repeal the Act. I see people more often than not invoking it as a constitutional principle preventing the military from doing this or that.
Local FOP members are generally the LEOs that are working the streets, not management. For the most part they are pro 2A. I will directly support our local FOP, you should check to see where your local FOP stands. Our local police chief and the mayor have publicly endorsed concealed carry.
Yes the FOP is considered to be a union, but in most areas it is more of a fraternity.
Donate to any LEO-affiliated organization? Don’t make me laugh!! ?
I donate to the local po po on a regular basis while exercising my right to push my gas pedal down a half inch more.
Our local FOP sponsors several youth sports organizations. Most of the funds come from police officers themselves. Several officers coach teams and the funds are for equipment and uniforms.
I am 76 years old and have always “Backed the Blue” even when they have caught me with too heavy a foot.
“Broadly speaking, rank and file police in America support gun rights.”
what’s the basis for this? high-ranking officers spout anti-gun rhetoric and testify for gun control. police groups do the same. are average police officers standing up against them or are we just presuming they’re all pro-gun for some other reason?
Elected Sheriffs support gun rights…
Not all of them do. The left coast and south of Florida is lousy with anti-gun Sheriffs. Mostly those who moved down here from the NE slave states. You can pretty much bet that if a Sheriff in one of the larger counties came from up north that he will be anti-Liberty and his minions, for the most part will follow his lead.
There’s no good way to get hard data, but these survey responses (to a survey conducted by PoliceOne in 2013) seem plausible to me.
https://www.policeone.com/police-products/press-releases/6188461-PoliceOne-com-Releases-Survey-of-15-000-Law-Enforcement-Professionals-about-U-S-Gun-Control-Policies/
LOL, a completely unscientific, online poll of a website that has affiliations with pro-gun websites “proves” that cops support 2A. Good one!
LOL. An internet survey run by a website that is linked to other pro-gun sites is touted as proof. As I recall, people on those pro-gun sites were encouraged to spam the survey as it was running to create this myth of the pro-gun beat cop.
In other words, this survey is worse than useless, it is deceptive. Meanwhile back in the real world, police unions have been cutting deals and carve-outs for themselves for years and the police chiefs that give the orders are consistently anti-2A.
“what’s the basis for this? ”
-Apart from anecdote, surveys conducted show the same- that ‘blue-shirt’ cops are generally in favor of 2nd Amendment rights (urban cops less than rural I bet). https://www.policeone.com/Gun-Legislation-Law-Enforcement/articles/6186552-Police-Gun-Control-Survey-Are-legally-armed-citizens-the-best-solution-to-gun-violence/
“high-ranking officers spout anti-gun rhetoric and testify for gun control”
– There are two kinds of people that get to be the kind of high ranks where they end up in press conferences. Elected sheriffs and people who make city politicians happy. The former are generally pro-gun with exceptions in urban areas; the latter are generally ‘anti’ gun because the politicians they depend upon for their jobs (they are selected and kept by those politicians, not seniority etc) are anti-gun.
“police groups do the same.”
-No, actually. If you look a the names of the groups up there you’ll see that they are made up of administrators, chiefs of police, etc. The fraternal order of police, PBA, etc would be examples of ‘cop’ groups instead of ‘political servant’ groups.
“are average police officers standing up against them or are we just presuming they’re all pro-gun for some other reason?”
– The average police officer skews largely republican at this point although they used to be considered very blue-dog democrat back when that was a thing. Unfortunately deciding to butt in when the chief is talking at a press conference would be a quick way to no longer be a police officer. Read ‘street-level’ stuff like “Second City Cop” to get a better idea of what cops think compared to the bosses.
You only hear what the media wants you to hear. Remember that line for any subject. The fact is the big city liberal police orgs and what not get all kinds of air time when they voice their support for gun control. You never hear about the majority of police/sheriffs who are red blooded conservatives because the media isn’t going to broadcast that.
I stuff their postage paid return envelopes with as much junk mail as I can fit.
Then chuckle as I drop it at the post office.
These kind of groups send me stuff on the regular with an envelope that has a stamp on it.
I cut it off, tape it to something else and use it to mail a contribution to a group I actually care about or pay a bill.
We should abolish police unions, preferably all unions but at least in public sector.. What a waste of taxpayer money.
Pro-2A cops are just anti-2A cops who haven’t yet been ordered to take away our guns. If the order comes down, cops will obey. And if anyone stands in their way, it will be Danziger Bridge all over again.
That about covers it. Way too much pension money at stake to disobey any order.
That’s totally not true. But continue with your totally biased opinions. I mean… if you live in a deep blue city/state then yes, you’re correct. But you’re dead wrong about most of America in the fly over states.
When the choice is between feeding their kids and your rights, you better believe that Bubba Jr, is going to get his slop.
You could make that same argument about anyone, including yourself. In a hypothetical future where the democrats regain a remarkable amount of power and decide to enact gun confiscation… those that sit on the sidelines and allow the fascist left to continue un opposed, allowing their own principles to be sodomized, are as guilty as the police- by association at that point, by refusing to resist. Wars are not only fought by childless men.
True, but salaried employees with pensions are not typically revolutionaries either.
Indeed. One reason I hope the day never comes. Most people in general (especially conservatives, because they work for a living) have a lot to lose. Pay, Retirements, mortgages, families. Like with any war, how many families are going to stick together when the man leaves for years, especially when he won’t be drawing a paycheck.
370,000,000 citizens armed with 400,000,000 guns vs. 700,000 cops….. thats 500:1 ….. even if only 1% rise up thats 5:1 against the cops (and thats a BIG assumption thinking cops will go along with that scheme). Cops dont stand a chance and the pols know it. Stop crapping your pants. Beware incrementalism and the soft tyranny. Thats how they’ll get you…. or rather your great grand kids. They play the long game.
I know someone who works with a police department in OK and he said that all of the officers in his department have stated they would refuse any orders to do widespread gun confiscation. He also said that his friends that work for the OKCPD have told him most of the OKC officers would also refuse to carry out orders like that.
As Hank stated above there are many places in fly-over America that the police would sooner side with the locals than the gov.
Stupid.
Texas Police and Sheriff’s Union’s have no problem opposing every single armed citizen bill that comes to the floor. It’s time our legislature started realizing that the police/sheriff’s unions have been wrong on every single gun bill that has been passed into law since 1995, and that their testimony is not worth any paper it may be printed on.
…The Hispanic-American Police Command Officers Association, The International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators, The International Association of Chiefs of Police
There is your problem.
America is for Americans, the rest of you lot can fuck straight off.
Big City police chiefs are all democrat political hacks.
Wow. A lot of vitriol hurled at cops and police unions getting slung here. Rather than respond in kind, I’m just going to attribute it to ignorance, i.e., a lot of the people who see fit to excoriate police unions and cops in general simply have no idea what they’re talking about. I know what it was like before my department was represented at the bargaining table by the Fraternal Order of Police. Our salaries were what we were paid. There was no such thing as being paid overtime, no matter how many hours you had to work during a pay period. Have to go to court on your day off? Let me punch your T.S. card, pal. We didn’t get paid for that. Unfairly lose time off because a supervisor didn’t like you and decided to impose an arbitrary punishment for which you had no appeal? Get that card out again. The FOP put a stop to all of those abuses, things which I doubt most of you would tolerate in your job.
Are you the same guys who bemoan the “militarization” of the police? Do you think that maybe subjecting them to the same constraints and discipline necessary in the military is going to improve their morale and performance? As a former Sergeant of Marines (I was in Vietnam at this time 50 years ago), I can tell you that it isn’t going to work. And if you think that cops get to skate when they do wrong, let me set you straight on that, too. Trial boards on my department were meticulous, fair, and merciless to bad cops. If you screwed up, the punishments were usually much more harsh than they would be to someone convicted of a similar offense in a “civilian” court. Cops, as they should be, are held to a higher standard and human frailty is not tolerated as it is in other venues.
I’ve known many cops and most of them are “gun guys” just like us. As has already been pointed out, those who have to depend upon “toeing the line” for their continued employment do so. If their employer demands of them that they condemn firearms, they do that if they want to keep their jobs.
I’m not going to blow smoke up your collective ass and say that every cop and every police agency is composed of the most sterling individuals who have ever strode the Earth. I’ll just tell you that some of the finest human beings I’ve known in my 70+ years just happened to wear a badge. If you’d like to disagree, fine. I’m perfectly willing to debate the subject.
I don’t doubt what you say. And I agree that cops should not be required to perform work without compensation – generally speaking, that’s a violation of labor laws.
but not all precincts/departments are ethically run when it comes to bad cops.
LA is notorious for corruption. And in the other LA (Louisiana), they had cops moonlighting as hitmen.
There’s a case in Eastern Kentucky right now where the police (or sheriff’s deputies, can’t remember) are charged with colluding with a guy who bribed them to frame someone else for a murder. We all need to do all we can to hold our law enforcement officers accountable.
With that said, it sounds like this guy works for a solid agency. I wish they were all ethical and full of gun guys! Way too much corruption nationally…
Cops who advocate for gun control make me sick.
Cops who usurp the 2A are traitors seeking to undermine fundamental American liberties.
Seriously, they are traitors. They know nothing of American history or why this country was founded and then broke away from England. They seek to turn America into just another semi-socialist country in which all arms reside solely in the hands of authorities.
Defund the funders.
Throw tea in the harbor.
Dammit! To think that I was considering moving to Texas! How is it that Dallas fell to the citizen-disarmists?
Alabama Sheriff’s Association is anti-gun as well. They fought changing the state from may-issue to shall-issue. They lost. They fought Constitutional Carry for the state. They won again this year.
They are oath-breakers and not worthy of respect.
In all these gun discussions, I hear that times have changed. We are a more peaceful world. We don’t need guns. REALLY? Have you even listened to the news in the last 10 – 15 years. Citizens being gassed by their own governments. China and Russia on a mission to invade and steal more land and resources.
Our military spent years fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq trying to turn the tides against a sub-standard, low tech army. Russia could not defeat Afghanistan.
Can you imagine what can happen in our country with a coalition of China, Russia, and Iran hitting us on multiple fronts with high-tech armies.
You must be kidding if you think we should be disarming the 80,000,000 gun owners in our country to save a few. We need to be protecting the 300,000,000 citizens, when the time comes.
It really is amazing how people they interview don’t know what they are talking about in the second amendment. Don’t know any technical aspects of the guns they are talking about. Don’t know any of the real crime statistics from the CDC and FBI. Yet they want to change the laws. Change what, base on what?
The ultimate reality if you look at the REAL statistics, and you change the gun laws against self-defense, you will be killing 10’s of thousand more people a year that use a gun in self-defense. If they don’t have their guns, they have no defense. Especially the weak.