Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal takes a back seat to no one in his assiduous opposition to civilian firearms ownership rights. Now, as he looks ahead into the abyss of two more years of GOP Congressional control under a President Trump who has pledged support for the RKBA, you can almost smell his desperation evident in the press conference comments he delivered yesterday with family members and survivors of “gun violence.”
Surveying a playing field arrayed against him, the senator dropped back and heaved hail Mary pass, making a transparent attempt to appeal to Trump’s ego and his love of doing the unpredictable.
“Shortly, we’ll have a new president unlike President Obama – hardly committed to the cause of ending gun violence, but there is a moment of opportunity here. And my hope is that newly elected President Trump will use this opportunity much as President Nixon did in going to China. It’s a Nixon to China moment for Donald Trump when he can defy the expectation, do the unpredictable – he likes doing the unpredictable – respond to a rally, which he also likes to do, and the rally is the America people who are clamoring and demanding action.”
Just where this alleged rally is manifesting itself and who’s doing the rallying wasn’t made clear by the Constitution State senator.
According to Blumenthal, The Donald now has the opportunity for a “legacy moment.” Never mind the fact that he hasn’t yet be sworn into office. Crediting the work of groups like Sandy Hook Promise and the Newtown Action Alliance, he called on the president-elect to defy expectations and support universal background checks, ban terrorists from buying guns (no really, he said that), and end the firearms industry’s immunity against frivolous lawsuits known as the PLCAA.
The prospects of President Trump obliging the senior senator from Connecticut seem, well, remote. Then again, trust but verify. Given the cabinet appointments so far, the president-elect seems to be preparing to govern as he campaigned. However we’ll be watching his Supreme Court appointment(s) and legislative priorities with interest. Watch this space.