Matt Larosiere gets it half right in Gun Rights Aren’t Safe in a Trump Presidency. Frankly, only a fool would think gun rights are safe in any presidency. Especially while plutocrats like Michael Bloomberg, George Soros and others seem so willing to spend big dollars to sway the less-informed.
Again, Matt makes some good points in his Washington Times op-ed.
Mr. Trump and the Republican Party at large haven’t done gun owners any favors.
Amen. They haven’t for years, thanks to the Republican leadership that have become swamp creatures.
The administration has managed to ban possession of “bump stocks” by administrative fiat, making felons out of tens of thousands of gun owners overnight.
Trump’s ATF passed the fiat order banning bump stocks by unlawfully and grossly overstepping its regulatory authority. As I’ve written before, Trump is no dummy. He knew an ATF bump stock ban – not a “Trump” ban – would be overturned by the court in short order.
And that process continues today. In the meantime, DJT allowed the ATF to throw that giant red herring at Democrats who really wanted to ban semi-auto firearms and enact all manner of gun control measures, including universal background checks, age restrictions, and magazine capacity limits. They took it as a victory, even though they received little or nothing of actual value. As did their sycophant Democrat operatives-with-bylines in the mainstream media.
[The Trump administration] also supported state efforts to implement red flag laws, restrict the gun rights of young adults, and threatened gun owners with domestic surveillance and unconstitutional seizures. So much for that “crashing end” to the assault on the Second Amendment.
Talk is cheap. On both sides of the equation.
Mr. Obama’s administration, on the other hand, relaxed prohibitions on carrying firearms on federal land, and made it easier for people to acquire NFA items like suppressors and machine guns. Of course, it wasn’t all good. The administration also cracked down on homemade firearms and tightened some import restrictions.
Laugh out loud. Obama “relaxed prohibitions on carrying firearms on federal land” because that language was attached to a must-sign appropriations bill if I recall correctly. Not because Obama held some deep-seated desire to facilitate self-defense for the little people on federal lands.
I’m unsure of the background on NFA changes, but I will say they affected only a tiny subset of 330 million Americans.
But despite constant claims that Republicans are beholden to gun rights organizations, when the GOP held the entire government in 2017 and 2018, nothing changed — no concealed-carry reciprocity, no deregulation of firearm suppressors, no changes to any of the thousands of absurd regulations from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF).
Spot on, Matt.
In fact, during the time the Republicans controlled the entire government, all that passed was stiffer background checks. Mr. Trump could’ve taken action on many of these items anytime he wanted. This doesn’t sound like a party under the thumb of gun owners.
“Mr. Trump could’ve taken action on many of these items anytime he wanted?” Really? Trump can’t pass legislation. That requires both houses of Congress to act and the president’s signature.
Peeking under the hood for why nothing happened in the first two years of Trump’s administration, one need look no further than Senate President Mitch McConnell for the lack of progress. He kept pro-gun legislation buried on his desk.
Concealed carry reciprocity? Passed in the House early in that Congressional term. Cocaine Mitch was unwilling to break “with tradition” and pass the bill with a simple majority as he’s done with Trump’s (outstanding) judicial nominees.
McConnell is nothing more than the latest Republican swamp dweller to talk a good game on guns, but doesn’t deliver in Congress when the opportunity arises.
If you want to blame one person for a failure to move pro-gun legislation at the federal level, that person would be McConnell, the longest-serving Republican U.S. Senate leader in history.
Clearly, the GOP has gotten lackadaisical on the concept of civil rights. Some Republicans are even throwing support to dangerous red flag laws and other worrisome proposals, such as the TAPS Act, which would see law enforcement combing social media for “threats” to “manage.”
Amen to that. Hence why gun rights aren’t safe under any administration and we can’t become complacent. And frankly, complacency has allowed all manner of anti-gun legislation to pass in the states.
Meanwhile, as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made clear, Senate Republicans are waiting for Mr. Trump to hand them an agenda on gun control — entirely forgetting how our government is supposed to operate.
Ideally, McConnell would find himself defeated by a primary challenger in this coming year’s primary election season. Defeated by a candidate who genuinely backs gun rights in very gun-friendly Kentucky. However, with Cocaine Mitch’s many decades serving as Kentucky’s Senator and de facto Republican Party leader in the Bluegrass State, it’s unlikely anyone can overcome his name recognition (to say nothing of the perks of incumbency).
Besides, despite McConnell’s failings on gun rights, he does enjoy the complete and total animus of the Left thanks to his so effectively pushing Trump’s judicial nominations past intransigent Democrats. They hate him with a white-hot passion.
The bottom line: No, President Trump doesn’t walk on water when it comes to guns and gun rights. However, he has done more to resist gun control than any president in the last few generations.
Matt and I agree on most things. But the bottom line remains that America faces a stark choice in 2020.
Contrast what Trump has and hasn’t done with the adamant, signed-in-blood pledges of any of the current clown car full of gun ban confiscation activists seeking the Democrat presidential nomination.
It will fall upon the shoulders of freedom-loving Americans and gun owners to go to the polls and cast their ballots accordingly both in 2020’s primary races as well as the November general elections. Ultimately, protecting gun rights always falls on our shoulders, not any given politician’s.