Leo Hohmann – Leo’s Newsletter July 16, 2024

The Republican National Committee has removed almost every reference to the right to keep and bear arms from the 2024 party platform, a signal that those at the top of the ticket will be positioned to compromise on the issue.

Trump has in the past already supported one of the most pernicious anti-Second Amendment policies – so-called red-flag laws – which allow authorities to confiscate a citizen’s firearms without any crime having been committed or any solid evidence that a crime has been planned. All that is needed is an accusation by someone, anyone, that you as a gun owner could be a threat to yourself or someone else.

Here’s the exact quote from Trump, made in 2018, where he advocated seizing firearms from Americans without any proof that they’re about to commit a crime, then going to court later to figure out if it was justified:

“Take the firearms first and then go to court, because that’s another system. Because a lot of times, by the time you go to court, it takes so long to go to court, to get the due process procedures. I like taking the guns early. Like in this crazy man’s case that just took place in Florida, he had a lot of firearms – they saw everything – to go to court would have taken a long time, so you could do exactly what you’re saying, but take the guns first, go through due process second.”

Trump, while president, also moved to ban bump stocks.

But despite the party elites watering down the GOP platform’s commitment to the Second Amendment, the party’s rank-and-file members are showing no signs of moving toward gun control.

The pro-2A website Bearing Arms reports that a pair of Reuters reporters covering the RNC in Milwaukee found out that delegates are still as firm as they’ve ever been when it comes to support of the Second Amendment. The reporters were shocked. They thought the targeting of Trump by a would-be assassin firing an AR-15 rifle at Trump’s head would have had the desired effect. They were wrong.

Bearing Arms writes:

“Tim Reid and Helen Coster are supposed to be straight news reporters, but they couldn’t help but inject a note of incredulity in their filing; how on earth could these delegates still oppose a ban on so-called assault weapons after their party leader was nearly killed by an assassin with an AR-15 last weekend? Yet in interviews with 12 Donald Trump delegates at his Republican Party nominating convention in Milwaukee, none advocated for limits or bans on assault rifles, raising the legal age to buy a gun, or even more robust background checks.”

The delegates interviewed were dead set against any laws imposing new restrictions on firearms.

Which is exactly the right response.

The website asks, rightly so, what kind of reforms would have stopped this attack from taking place?

The gun that was used in the assassination attempt was legally purchased more than a decade ago, so universal background checks and raising the age to purchase a gun from 18 to 21 wouldn’t have made a difference.

What about banning the AR-15 gun itself?

The killer could have just as easily used a bolt-action rifle, which in fact is the rifle of choice for many snipers. They’re slower to reload but extremely accurate.

The problem isn’t the hardware or the tool. The problem is the heart of the murderer.

If Trump goes soft on the Second Amendment, he wont’ be the first Republican to go over to the dark side. President Ronald Reagan’s press secretary, James Brady, was a solid 2A supporter until he took a bullet from Reagan’s would-be assassin, John Hinkley Jr., and wound up in a wheelchair.

Let’s hope Trump doesn’t similarly waver.

Subscribe

Source