By NRA-ILA
Over the holiday weekend, a conservative “taxpayer watchdog” group sent out an email to its contact list which gave the impression that NRA-ILA does not oppose “red flag” legislation in Texas. One wonders what the organization hoped to accomplish by confusing and attempting to divide the gun community in this way.
Let’s set the record straight:
- NRA-ILA submitted written testimony to the House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence at their June 25, 2018 interim hearing on red flag legislation, questioning the need for any additional statutes in Texas to address dangerous persons with mental illnesses having access to firearms, and outlining our opposition to red flag bills in other states that were considering such proposals at the time.
- NRA-ILA provided verbal testimony in opposition to red flag legislation, raising the same points, during the July 24, 2018 hearing held before the Senate Select Committee on Violence in Schools & School Security.
- NRA-ILA alerted its membership to the introduction of anti-gun legislation, including proposed red flag measures House Bill 131 by Rep. Joe Moody (D-El Paso) and Senate Bill 157 by Sen. Jose Rodriguez (D-El Paso), prior to the Texas Legislature convening or the bills even receiving a committee referral.
NRA-ILA strongly opposes HB 131 and SB 157. These bills could allow a court to require an individual to surrender firearms to law enforcement, based on statements made by a petitioner in an ex parte proceeding — before any formal hearing with the opportunity to be represented by counsel and present counter-evidence — and even though they may not have committed or even threatened to commit any unlawful or violent act. Someone could be stripped of their Second Amendment rights without due process, without being taken into custody for any criminal offense or without being required to undergo evaluation for treatment by a mental health professional.
Please contact your State Representatives and urge them to OPPOSE House Bill 131. Please also contact your State Senators and urge them to OPPOSE SB 157. NRA-ILA will notify you when a public hearing is set on either of these measures.
This article originally appeared at nraila.org and is reprinted here with permission.
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“a conservative “taxpayer watchdog” group sent out an email to its contact list which gave the impression that NRA-ILA does not oppose “red flag” legislation in Texas.”
What could ever give them that idea…
So, objectively, he says in the video that they are calling on the courts to intervene “with due process.” He says “join us” in pursuing this legislation
But that’s a far cry from the statements in the article saying they oppose red flag legislation.
No support from me.
Umm . . . If you have “due process” you pretty much obviate the logic behind a “red flag” law which is specifically intended to extend ex parte intrusions into gun-ownership. Essentially, a red-flag law is predicated on a denial of one’s citizenship rights. Due process, which would be messy and fractious at best, is nonetheless a legal process that protects our rights as citizens. It’s mistake to conflate the two issues.
I agree with you. The video says they want red flag laws with “due process” but the article says they oppose red flag laws.
I was saying they will get no support for me not only for advocating red flag laws but also because of the double speak.
Nanashi,
Hmm. Good find. Looks like the NRA is trying to talk out of both sides of their mouth.
Personally, I don’t see how someone can be for risk protection orders and then also claim to be for due process.
A risk protection order deprives someone of their liberty and property before they have actually harmed anyone. Even worse, it requires the subject of the risk protection order to somehow prove that they are not a risk. This is monumentally problematic for two reasons:
(1) You cannot prove a negative — that you are not a risk.
(2) The burden of proof in criminal prosecution is on the accuser. But risk protection orders place the burden of proof on the accused.
For the above reasons, there is no way that a risk protection order can comply with due process. Or am I missing something?
Or the option is to not do anything, and then with enough published shootings we could loose the 2nd completely.
The trick to reduce the perceived carnage to the point where the 2nd is not in jeopardy. And do it in a way that minimizes the amount of power we give the government. Because the one thing more dangerous than a nut case with a gun, is a nut case government with one.
But have enough loonies shooting people and people will just keep on giving even more power to the government. Have it turn out later that they had encounters with cops that never resulted in and actual conviction and look out! Then people blame the government for it, and then what do you expect to happen?
Is this comment supposed to be sarcasm?
The ONLY time ANY individual has had ANY success is when there is no ARMED resistance. No law will change that. Laws that eliminate firearms in the hands of citizens will only make the body count higher. It doesn’t matter what the promise intention of the law was.
Neville Binderlain…
“The trick to reduce the perceived carnage to the point where the 2nd is not in jeopardy.” That is not sarcasm, that is a FACT.
Doesn’t matter what is in the Constitution, you get enough people thinking that a “right” is too much of a threat to then and theirs and you can kiss that right good by. I had a Korean War vet stating that the world is so much worse that when he was a young after the Aurora shooting, and I was just dumbfounded.
Correct. If you want to protect the 2nd, their must be a mechanism to identify the loonies and isolate them. We know the left will use this opportunity to target any and every gun owner for confiscation through mere allegations. We also know that left untouched, these loonies will kill hundreds, if not thousands of more innocents, leading to the the effective neutering of the 2nd.
It’s a rock and a hard place.
Meanwhile, the divide and conquer Soros followers come to this and other similar sites to bash the NRA. They tell you who the most effective advocate for the 2nd is by the amount of vitriol they pour onto the NRA. They want the NRA gone. They are using these sites to make it happen.
If you differ with a position of the NRA, why not get involved and work to change it? Ok – it would take more than bitching and whining and claiming not another dime from your pocket will ever go to the NRA, as if a dime has ever left your pocket to go to the NRA. So, your non-participation is understood, even though irrational.
Go ahead and fund the nice houses and swimming pools of these other one man pro-gun organizations that are only attractive to you because they bitch a little more loudly than you. Spoiler alert, find a new hobby – because your actions will make the 2nd a historical footnote.
Now, was this the Texas NRA speaking for itself, or for the org as a whole? Because the org as a whole has *repeatedly* endorsed both the idea of Red Flags as well as specific proposals that dispense with due process (coincidentally the same ones as Trump)
That’s because the NRA has to be a LOT more centrist than most people who post here are. At the end of the day, if too may people think that gun rights should be restricted than that is exactly what is going to happen.
The Texas NRA fired a woman who actually supported the 2nd.
This is why we need a like button. The NRA, and their two faced ways, are as much the enemy as DiFi is. At least she will tell you straight up what she wants. The NRA tap dances around like Gregory Hines on extasy.
You beat me to it. I remember being so furious at the NRA when I first saw that video.
Chris Cox and Wayne Lapierre need to go NOW/PDQ/RFN.
Wow, that’s damning for the NRA. It like all these politicians these days that say stuff and then get busted because internet allows it to get out there.living 40 years ago when looking up speeches and votes was difficult and arduous.
Tech has changed you old dinosaurs, we can find out the truth with a keyword search and then quickly show others with a link or cut and past.
The truth is you can’t stop violence. No one can in a free society. Hell, not even in a communist or soscialist society. To say you can is naïve it best, or a blatant lie at worst!
Don’t mess with Texas
I think the issue is Texas messing with its people, not vice versa.
Wow the NRA thinks so little of people they think they can get away with this shit.
So who the hell is this “taxpayer watchdog” group? Or they some “anonymous” gaggle of giggling idiots.
maybe Grover.
Red Flag laws are just a way for the Snowflakes to use the police to confiscate your guns. Someone who hates you, a girlfriend or ex-wife anyone with a gripe against you can call up lodge a red flag complaint and there go your guns. Anyone who signs on to this madness needs to be voted out of office. Remember the Founders stated the Bill of Rights, of which the 2nd Amendment is Article 2, is a document listing GOD given rights which no person shall tamper with.
Everyone knows this. Never-the-less, the snowflakes appear to be winning the legal battles. Perhaps the legal battles should be set aside in favor of more assertive, and old fashioned, battles.
“Your pathetic weapons laws affect me not, because I am the weapon. The tools I use are of no relevance” ; Wu Tang Possum ; 1191 Year of the Colt
All these naysayers. No compromise, take no prisoners. The NRA is a trader to it’s membership etc. You still don’t get it. When the smoke clears most of you so called 2nd amendment warriors will crawl back under your rock in fear of any compromise. The NRA has been and always will be your greatest defender In safe guarding our firearms freedom. 5 million strong and counting, this is our regulated army. Unless you understand the strategy of winning please restrain your ingnorance when addressing the issues regarding our God giving rights. All for one and one for all. God Bless America!
The NRA is a trader, they trade gun rights so that they can fear monger to get donations to line their pockets.
Lol, Trader.
The NRA is in the fear mongering business, that’s it. Hell, they initially supported half the stuff they now say they’re against. I’m a lifer and the only thing they get from me now is my ballot annually. All my 2A money goes to FPC.
PS It’s TRAITOR knucklehead. And yes, the NRA are traitors.
Negotiating Rights Away
It is entirely possible that the Texas NRA-ILA is opposing the Red Flag bill in Texas. Which as absolutely nothing to do with the National NRA-ILA position on Red Flag laws in general or even the National NRA-IL position on the Red Flag bills being considered in Texas.
The national NRA-ILA, just like the national NRA that runs it, is often 180° apart from its state level organizations. At the national level the NRA and its NRA-ILA are actively supporting the so-called Red Flag laws so long as those laws have some semblance of “due process” included. Unfortunately the NRA’s idea of “due process” falls far short of what most American gun owners would consider adequate “due process” for a court to renege their right to keep and bear arms. The NRA has consistently accepted ex parte proceedings so long as the subject is provided an opportunity to appeal to the court to reinstate their rights after their firearms have already been seized.
The NRA is cooked.
Charlton Heston was an anti-gun globalist spook of the highest order.
Don’t ask me for evidence of this unless you are serious.
Having said that, your comment begs the question to be asked. So I is axing….
NRA are cucks, GOA actually cares about your rights. NRA just cares about money.
Yeah I agree the NRA has frequently screwed up and there’s lots of reasons to be pissed at them. I wouldn’t dump them, there’s lots of good there still. I’d try to fix stuff. They still get an annual $100 from me, as does the GOA and SAF. We need all three, warts and all.
That said ……
We are going to lose our Second Amendment rights eventually because of all these voices refusing to do anything about violent people.
A husband known to hit his wife, to make threats against his wife, murders her and the kids then shoots himself. Or an obsessed boyfriend threatens his ex-girlfriend who begs the police for help but they have zip for laws to act upon. She ends up dead, it’s blasted all over the news. Incidents like these feed the fear of us and our guns.
Yes, hell yes that woman can be encouraged to get a gun and learn to use it. Guess what, a good guy with a gun does not always come out on top. Sometimes the bad guy wins until more good guys show up and ruin his day, or he shoots himself. Either way, yet another incident to feed the Hoplophobia, and again our rights are on the burner.
Yes that’s just plain stupid, to fear the inanimate object. But that is human nature for a growing portion of the population. A fact that is being ignored by defenders of the Second Amendment. That shifting demographic is too weak today, and we have made advances restoring our rights. This cannot last. As the population shifts the violence and the stupid reaction to it will move too many voters against the Second Amendment.
Either we do something about the violence, or our kids and grand-kids will see these rights go bye-bye.
Been saying this for years to SAF, GOA and NRA (in letters that generate more junk mail back at me). Pro-Second Amendment groups should be arguing for lots of taxpayer dollars going into mental health. Into expanding the early detection practices championed by the US Secret Service in their Safe Schools Initiative. Into our side writing the laws (often just amendments to existing 72 hour hold laws) to push violent people into treatment AND put in the due process protections that WE say protect the innocent from false charges.
I do not believe that any of that will happen. What I see coming is eventually enough violence will push enough voters to act stupidly and the worst versions of these laws will succeed.
That’s what happens when you ignore problems and pretend that the other stuff you do is enough. Well it ain’t enough, not nearly enough.
“We are going to lose our Second Amendment rights eventually because of all these voices refusing to do anything about violent people.”
The exercise of the unalienable individual right has been and will be infringed because of GOVERNMENT. Full stop.
An armed population prevents tyranny. A government cannot become more tyrannical beyond a certain point when the population is well armed.
If you are looking for an argument against the citizenry being armed to the teeth and a real threat to any potential tyranny, you cannot have one. Because we agree, the Second amendment enshrines the right of the people to be as well armed as they want to be. Well enough to fight off a tyrant, should the need arise.
None of which has anything to do with this topic. Other than to describe something we will lose if we do not get a hell of a lot smarter about protecting it.
I’m not looking for an argument. My post is spot on target and very relevant.
You are placing blame in the wrong place and it is a dangerous thing. It is a red herring.
Sorry to have misread your intent.
What is a “Government” but a collection of people given authority and responsibility by other people. People who push governments into taking actions, creating laws. Groups of people who get one of their own to run for office, become a part of government. Or take jobs in government, become administrators and bureaucrats.
Of course the actions of government are what changes laws to either threaten our rights or reinforce those rights.
Like the State I live in where Government passed laws to renew the truth of Constitutional Carry. Government didn’t do that because “Government” wanted to do it. Government did that because enough of the people who create and influence and become part of a government won out over those who disagreed.
We can win or lose by paying attention to where all the outrage is coming from. Or we can embrace things like conspiracy theories and other drivel, and make losing all the more certain.
The Supreme Court just ruled 9-0 against law enforcement and asset forfeitures. The only time these forfeitures can be accomplished is with due process and convictions. I know it’s probably a slim chance, but maybe the high court will expand the ruling to include red flag laws. We can certainly hope.
They didn’t rule against it just excessive theft in the name of the law.
At first it was a good idea for putting more pain on drug dealers and rich bad guys, taking the loot of all their bad deeds. But cop agencies ruined it with their greed and contempt for the innocent citizens of this country. Life savings stolen, lives ruined because some police agency with dollar signs in their eyeballs saw something worth stealing under the color of authority.
Supreme Court did the right thing on this one.
NRA-ILA did, in fact support ERPOs as shown in the video clip, but with caveats about due process etc. What the new laws proposed and enacted are ignoring is the caveats, moving to straight up confiscation with no due process. People trying to sell the laws are claiming support from the NRA to give them credibility and if one lone wolf legislator signs on it becomes ‘bi-partisan’ lending even more credibility.
We have a way of taking guns away from people with due process. It’s called trying them for a crime they committed or provably planned to commit. If they can’t be proven to have commited or planned to commit a crime there’s no cause to deprive them of liberty.
We also have psychiatric short term holds for evaluation. A very good idea but also very broken. A mish-mash of weak laws, no training, too few facilities for all the crazies, no where near enough doctors or nurses. We used to be in a much better situation but we tore it all down and bragged about it around forty years ago.