Over the weekend, the governor of California managed to use the tragic incident in Virginia Beach to score cheap political points.
Here are the facts, as reported: The shooter legally purchased both handguns he used in this criminal attack. Newsom’s take: “We just don’t need background checks on guns, we need background checks on every single ammunition purchase…”
California Dreaming
Ignore for a minute the fact that someone who clearly passed two separate FBI background checks to purchase handguns would undoubtedly pass the same check to purchase ammunition. Just because California has a law on the books doesn’t mean it will accomplish anything but serving as an inconvenience for law-abiding citizens.
During the Obama Administration, his Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Countryman fought against including ammunition in the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
He warned the international community of “significant burdens associated with licensing, authorizations, and record keeping.” Countryman continued, “Our own experience in regulating domestic transfers has shown that there is little utility for law enforcement in imposing the same controls on ammunition transfers as we do on arms. Accordingly, the United States largely eliminated most controls on domestic transfers of ammunition.”
Sen. Booker Steps In It Too
Even fellow Democratic presidential candidate, and bad-idea generator, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, couldn’t even pretend to name a policy that would have prevented the incident.
The Virginia Beach Police Chief has publicly stated that no gun control law would have changed the outcome of the attack: “We do have the Second Amendment, it is very stringent for our country. In this particular case the weapons were obtained legally. Everything was done in a legal manner by this individual.”
Yet the spotlight-hungry Newsom thinks he knows better than Virginia how the state should legislate away the Second Amendment rights of Virginians. Fortunately, Newsom’s vision of a California-ized America will have to wait.
Larry Keane is SVP for Government and Public Affairs, Assistant Secretary and General Counsel at National Shooting Sports Foundation.