gun guns seller store retailer assault rifle
(AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, File)

Our neighbors to the south apparently like getting slapped down in the US courts. Last year the Mexican government sued a group of American gun manufacturers for $10 billion, claiming they’re to blame for the country’s horrific violent crime problem. Earlier this month, a district court judge dismissed the lawsuit citing the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act.

Judge F. Dennis Saylor didn’t point out the fact that Mexico manages to “lose” about a third of the firearms it buys every year, but the respondents’ attorneys certainly would have if the suit had gotten that far.

Yesterday, with the help of the American civilian disarmament industry, the Mexican government went back to that well, filing another lawsuit, this time against five Arizona gun retailers it claims are the source of illegal straw purchases that arm drug cartels and enable them to murder Mexican citizens and each other.

According to a Mexican government press release . . .

The lawsuit is part of a multifaceted strategy by the Government of Mexico to stop the avalanche of guns, particularly assault weapons, coming from the United States that empower criminal groups, cause bloodshed in Mexico and contribute to drug trafficking to the United States.

This court action in no way challenges the Constitutional right of U.S. citizens to bear arms, nor the right of stores to sell their products responsibly and lawfully. The lawsuit addresses a cause shared by both countries, whose citizens suffer from illicit firearms practices.

Mexico claims that the targeted gun stores . . .

…do not comply with required safeguards; cause foreseeable damage; use misleading and tendentious advertising; sell guns that are turned into automatic weapons; cause a disturbance of public order, and violate state and federal laws, causing enormous damage in Mexico.

A legal adviser to Mexico’s Foreign Relations department claims . . .

“They are not careful when they sell products, so they allow straw purchasers to buy guns,” said Celorio Alcántara, adding they sold multiple guns, multiple times to some purchasers. “We are saying they are negligent and facilitate straw purchasers, to the point of being accomplices.”

That would, in fact, be terrible. But if that’s the case, as the Mexican government claims, we’re sure the sympathetic Biden administration wouldn’t hesitate to unleash a horde of weaponized ATF agents on the allegedly scofflaw gun stores.

Why not go after the stores that way? Answer: because there isn’t nearly as much opportunity for positive pub and sympathetic headlines by the reliably anti-gun US media in going that route.

Helping the Mexican government in this quixotic legal gambit — just as they did in the previous failed lawsuit against gun makers — are the intrepid attorneys of the Brady Campaign gun control advocacy operation. They apparently figure that if you throw enough legal feces against the wall, some of it will eventually stick.

The PLCAA protects gun retailers the same as it does the companies that manufacture firearms. That’s why our addled Commander-in-Chief rails against it so furiously and so loudly at every opportunity. That’s also the reason this Mexican lawsuit isn’t likely to be any more successful than the first one.

 

 

32 COMMENTS

  1. “…sell guns that are turned into automatic weapons…”

    And the retailer would have control over what is done to the gun after purchase? How, exactly? It’s not like they’re selling John Deere tractors.

    • Even John Deere have no control over who any purchaser might use their equipment. Maybe we should get a few hundred guys together, go buy an hundred large Deere tractors, drive them in a wide line across the border into Nogales and start flattening things there. Let the nation of Mexico then sue John Deere for misuse of their products?

      Son bién locos, los jefes allí

  2. F off Mexico. About the same as Chicago blaming neighboring states for its rampant and increasingly violent, ummm rampaging violence.

  3. what a great idea. i can just picture the light bulb popping on beneath the sombrero. billions for legally manufactured and sold products.
    send more mezal and stfu.

  4. wouldn’t mexico have more of a case suing Obama and Holder?? You know, people who actually allowed illegal weapons, sold illegally, to get into Mexico?

        • Didn’t BATF then charge the retailers with allowing straw purchases the BATF advised to be allowed to proceed?

          Damned if they do and damned if they don’t.

  5. So if Mexico had a valid complaint about the FFL’s, why would the AFT let them remain in business, since one tiny error is grounds for revocation?
    Methinks thou doth protest too much.

    • Nah, Eric Holder said it was OK, so no problemo amigo. (Funny how the Obama administration blocked all attempts to see how high the rot went. And the FBI didn’t do anything about it.)

  6. I think we should sue Mexico for letting their drug cartels supply the drugs that get into the United States AND for letting their people leave Mexico and illegally enter the United States.

    • Amen.

      Tell the commies running Mexico to sue the cartels if they want some money. Oh that’s right, they’re already bought and paid for by the cartels.

    • it’s the people that pass through Mexico that are the problem…something Trump put a stop to..

  7. I have great idea for our friends down south, build a wall to slow or stop the illegal weapons from entering your country from the states.

    • As soon as they figure out how to make a wall with a one-way gate (out only, no one gets in)? They’ll do it. Tourists can fly in, spend their money, then go home. There’ve been a number of articles recently about Mexicans complaining about gringo immigrants coming in, buying property, running up prices, etc.

      Mexico is cordially invited to osculate my anal sphincter.

  8. Stupid is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. This Mexican government needs to be fined for filling frivolous law suits.

  9. Its time for Border States to sue Mexico for the scourge of the Cartels and lack of immigration enforcement…

  10. They’re the ones with citizens sneaking in metric tons of a chemical compound more deadly then mustard gas over the border. I think it warrants a declaration of war on them and the cartels, and if the cartels get the bright idea to try to fight some kind of insurgency, we simply show them how much better our WMDs are then theres.

  11. Yep all those purchases Mexico talks about were told to go ahead with the sale by the FBI/BATF at the time!!!!

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