Yesterday, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam wiped the shoe polish off of his face long enough to hold a press conference and announce that he’s calling a special session of the state legislature. The session’s sole purpose: consider a raft of gun control proposals — an “assault weapons” ban, red flag law, magazine capacity limits, among others — that Northam wants enacted.
The Governor’s move is pure partisan politics cloaked in the guise of doing something about gun violence. The Virginia Beach shooting, perpetrated by a disturbed individual who had bought his guns legally, provided Northam the ideal cover he needed.
The Citizen’s Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms sees Northam’s cynical effort for what it is. Here’s their press release . . .
BELLEVUE, WA – Virginia Governor Ralph Northam is using the tragedy at Virginia Beach to resurrect a hackneyed gun control agenda that would not have prevented the crime, while distancing himself from the scandal that should have forced him from office, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.
Northam has proposed a sweeping gun control package that includes so-called “universal background checks,” bans on so-called “assault weapons” and suppressors, extreme risk protection orders, child access prevention and other restrictions, as reported by USA Today.
“We’ve got a news flash for Northam,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “The killer in Virginia Beach had already passed multiple background checks, including an enhanced check to legally purchase a suppressor. The incident didn’t involve a so-called ‘assault weapon,’ but two handguns. There was no indication that the gunman was an extreme risk to anybody, and this awful event didn’t involve a child gaining access to any firearm.
“So tell us, Ralph,” he continued, “just what part of your extremist gun control wish list do you think would have prevented what happened in Virginia Beach?”
Reports quote Northam rejecting arguments that it is “too soon after the tragedy to address the issues.” Gottlieb said this is one point on which he can agree with the scandal-plagued governor.
“It’s never too soon to show the emperor has no clothes,” he observed. “Northam has dusted off the same ragged old gun prohibition agenda that has been proposed by other anti-rights politicians in the past and rejected time after time. None of the things he wants would have made even the slightest difference, and he knows it.
“The Virginia Beach killer purchased his guns in 2016 and last year,” Gottlieb noted. “This was no spur-of-the-moment decision that might have been averted by any of Northam’s recommendations, including the governor’s one-gun-per-month purchase limitation scheme.
“What happened Friday in Virginia Beach was undeniably a tragedy,” Gottlieb concluded, “and it would be another tragedy for Northam to penalize millions of honest Virginia gun owners for the senseless act of a lone, disturbed individual. Northam’s extremist mandates would not prevent a single crime or save a single life.”
With more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (www.ccrkba.org) is one of the nation’s premier gun rights organizations. As a non-profit organization, the Citizens Committee is dedicated to preserving firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected officials and facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in local communities throughout the United States.
