Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund, the political arm of one of the nation’s largest gun control groups, is pouring an additional $700,000 into Virginia elections.
The organization announced Monday it would donate $400,000 to Democratic gubernatorial candidate Ralph Northam and $300,000 to Democratic Attorney General Mark Herring’s re-election bid in the final two weeks before election day.
That comes on top of an earlier $1 million dollar commitment from the organization bankrolled by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
The article went on to remind us that Northam wants to ban so-called "assault weapons" and standard capacity (referred to by the gun ban lobby as "high-capacity") magazines. Northam also wants so-called "universal" background checks and to reinstate one-gun-a-month.
Also noted in the article is that Everytown is targeting minorities in the hope of increasing turnout for the gun ban candidates:
“African-American turnout will be crucial on Nov. 7 -- and we want to make sure black voters know what the stakes are in this race,” said Brynne Craig, an Everytown strategist. “Ed Gillespie walks in lock step with the NRA and his policies will make black communities less safe in the Commonwealth.”
It's actually safety concerns that prompt minorities, especially minority women, to buy firearms for self-defense, like this Chicago Tribune article notes:
It's why Chicago resident Chip Eberhart, a minority, trains others to use firearms for self-defense.
There is two weeks before election day. Money doesn't win elections, votes win elections. It is up to use to contact every gun owner we know and encourage them to vote on November 7th.
The Richmond Times Dispatch reports this morning that former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's Everytown for Gun Safety has committed to spend $1 Million in Virginia Elections this fall.
The fund is donating $450,000 directly to gubernatorial contender Ralph Northam, and spending $250,000 on mailers on his behalf. It's also giving $300,000 to Attorney General Mark Herring for his re-election bid, as he faces attack advertising from the National Rifle Association.
"We are making this initial investment because Ralph Northam and Mark Herring have been forceful champions for gun violence prevention in Virginia, while their opponents subscribe to a dangerous 'guns everywhere' agenda," Brynne Craig, a senior strategist for Everytown, said in a statement.
Everytown, a New York-based advocacy group largely bankrolled by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, has been a big spender in recent Virginia contests.
The article also reports that volunteers in the D.C., Maryland and Virginia area with another Bloomberg funded gun ban group, Moms Demand Action, plan to canvass and to make phone calls for Northam and other Democrats.
In addition to the Bloomberg groups, Americans for Responsible Solutions, a gun control group led by former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, has endorsed the Democratic ticket in Virginia, but has yet to announce any donations.
Look for this to just be a down payment on more spending. If Bloomberg was willing to spend $2 million in State Senate and House elections in 2015, you can bet he is going to spend more than the announced $1 million in state wide elections.
Update: I talked about this with NRATV host Cam Edwards later in the day.
The election results from last night confirmed that Donald Trump tapped in to an undercurrent of unrest among a segment of the public. Unless you were listening to certain talk radio programing, you heard that Trump was going to lose because polls showed he was trailing and could not win. National Review's Jim Geraghty addressed that in his post election Morning Jolt:
Everything I wrote yesterday about the polls generally being right most of the time is now inoperative. Pollsters have had off years before, but there has never been a colossal ten-car pile-up like this in the polling industry. The entire industry needs to scrap everything they know about the electorate and start over. One of the giant questions they must address is whether we now live in an atmosphere of such far-reaching and stifling social disapproval of politically incorrect positions that a significant portion of respondents no longer feel comfortable expressing their actual beliefs to a pollster.
As Geraghty said, there really is a "silent majority" that waited until election day to voice their opinion.
It also looks like the NRA knew what they were doing in their placement of Campaign Field Representatives (CFRs). NRA-ILA strategically chose eleven states to place one or more CFRs and their efforts paid off in seven in the Presidential race and helped defeat the so-called "universal background check" ballot initiative in Maine. NRA made it known via Twitter:
On the gun ban lobby side, Politico reported Monday that Bloomberg spent $65 million, with $25 million going to ballot initiatives including three gun related efforts, one in Washington (Allows courts to prevent dangerous individuals from acquiring guns), one in Nevada ("universal" background checks) and Maine ("universal" background checks), and the rest on several U.S. Senate candidates - both Republican and Democrat and several statewide races. On the ballot initiatives, he won handily in Washington, barely won in Nevada, and lost in Maine. He also had mixed results in the Senate and statewide candidate races.
Last night was a good night overall for gun owners. Trump has vowed to appoint justices to the Supreme court that will not overturn Heller. He has said he will put his Vice President Mike Pence in charge of the judicial appointments. We shall see. And, Bloomberg will continue to spend his unlimited pot of money at the state level in areas where he thinks he has the best shot to win. We need to analyze our win in Maine and use what worked there to defeat him going forward. But for now, we can all breath a sigh of relief that Hillary Clinton will not take up residence in the White House.
It appears Governor Terry McAuliffe is getting tired of getting beaten up by Bloomberg's gun ban group Everytown for Gun Safety. This from the Washington Post:
Brian Coy spoke dismissively of Everytown for Gun Safety, which is associated with former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, as a “group from New York” that does not have the interests of Virginians at heart.
“One group from New York and its affiliates are upset, but that does not represent Virginia views on this,” Coy said. “We had no interaction with Everytown, the national folks, until after this deal became public. We wouldn’t have even known who to call.”
The Post reminded Coy that Bloomberg came through when McAuliffe wanted money to buy the Virginia Senate during last year's election but, according to the Post, Coy did not back down from his comments:
“He talked to Howard Wolfson. Wolfson’s a political adviser to Bloomberg,” Coy said.” I don’t think he’s a policy advocate from this group. We’ve never heard from anybody at the staff level until now, after the deal has been finalized.”
The Post noted that Coy's comments were made to the Post two days after Everytown unleashed a social media campaign against McAuliffe for agreeing to a deal with GOP leadership to overturn Attorney General Mark Herring's unilateral action to break concealed carry recognition agreements with 25 states.
For Everytown's part, they turned to Andy Parker, a gun ban advocate whose daughter was killed on live TV by a disgruntled former colleague in August, to counter Coy:
“Governor McAuliffe can’t have it both ways,” Parker said. “He stood side-by-side with me and other Virginia survivors from the Everytown Survivor Network and worked closely with Everytown on the Whatever It Takes rally at the U.S. Capitol in September. I am his constituent and friend — I would have happily taken his call and pointed him to the right policy experts before he struck this dangerous deal with the gun lobby.”
Everytown also released emails to show just how much McAuliffe's office and the group had been in contact over 18 months.
McAuliffe's office also claimed they let Lori Haas, a Virginia gun ban advocate whose daughter was injured during the Virginia Tech shootings in 2007 was made aware of the deal, a claim that Haas disputes. She told the Post that she was only made aware of it less than 48 hours before the Post broke the story.
This just shows that McAuliffe is not above throwing all of his friends under the bus if he thinks it benefits him. If he is willing to do this to his friends, we should remember he can still do worse to us if it suits his agenda.
The Washington Post reports this morning that Bloomberg's Everytown for Gun Safety has turned its fire on Governor Terry McAuliffe via social Media:
On Wednesday, Everytown launched a social media campaign against McAuliffe, who last week stunned gun-safety advocates by announcing that he had struck a gun deal with Republican legislators and the National Rifle Association. It shows side-by-side photos of McAuliffe and the National Rifle Association’s Wayne LaPierre.
“What do VA Gov. Terry McAuliffe and NRA head Wayne LaPierre have in common?” one version reads. “Both Gov McAuliffe and NRA Head Wayne LaPierre support allowing dangerous people to carry hidden loaded weapons in Virginia.”
While clearly a lower-budget affair than last fall’s TV blitz, Everytown’s social media campaign against McAuliffe was a stunner, given how closely he worked with gun-safety groups since his 2013 campaign for governor. He narrowly won the race while bragging about his “F” rating from the NRA.
This Post article also infers not only did McAuliffe throw Attorney General Mark Herring under the bus, he did the same to the gun ban lobby:
The deal that the McAuliffe administration hammered out with GOP legislative leaders and the NRA caught gun-safety groups off guard. In December, Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) had severed reciprocity rights of gun owners in 25 states with concealed-weapons standards looser than Virginia’s — a move that had infuriated gun-rights activists even though state law has long dictated that reciprocity be limited to states with standards on par with Virginia’s.
The McAuliffe deal, which still needs General Assembly approval, reversed Herring’s action — and then some, directing him to strike reciprocity deals with every state that offers them. In that sense, the deal expands gun rights.
VSSA noted on its Twitter feed last Friday that McAuliffe's comments during the official announcement of the deal sounded like he was adding it to his resume for Vice President for his buddy Hillary Clinton:
Sounds like @GovernorVA adding another check mark for resume for Dem VP slot
The Post notes he also touted the deal with asked how he thought Clinton's gun control would play in New Hamshire:
Matthews asked McAuliffe, a close friend of Clinton’s and chairman of her failed 2008 bid, how the former secretary of state’s strong gun-control rhetoric might play in a rural state like New Hampshire. McAuliffe answered by touting the “historic agreement” he had just struck on guns.
“If you can do it Virginia, which is the home of the NRA, working together, we can do this anywhere,” he said. “People want, folks, they want their legislators to come together, to work with their governors to make them safe.”
Wonder how Bloomberg likes those bus tire tracks across his back.
After spending $43 million, including over $2 million dumped in by Michael Bloomberg's Everytown for Gun Safety, we wake up to the status quo - a state senate with 21 Republicans and 19 Democrats. The biggest win of the night goes to 10th Senate District GOP Candidate Glen Sturtevant, who overcame a $700,000 negative attack funded by Everytown and a 3500 vote deficit after 24 precincts in Chesterfield and 30 precincts in Richmond had been counted. It wasn't until the Powhatan registrar confirmed to a local television news reporter at approximately 9:00 PM that Sturtevant overwhelmingly beat Gecker in the county that the AP and other outlets started calling the race for the GOP candidate.
Breaking: In Powhattan --- numbers from the phone -- @gecker got 2,205 @GlenSturtevant 7,315. That's all 13 precints #va10
Because of the large number of votes cast in Powhatan, and the amount of time it took to report the totals, Senate Minority Leader Dick Saslaw told the Washington Post that Democrats had hopes that outcome would be reversed due to "irregularities." Gecker has yet to concede the race and sent staff to Powhatan to examine the returns. Sturtevant ended up with 73.8 percent of the vote in Powhatan where turnout was boosted by tightly contested local races.
In the other race that Bloomberg invested heavily, his chosen candidate won. Everytown immediately went to Twitter to claim victory, but was quickly reminded that spending over $2 million to hold a seat already held by an anti-gun Senator, while losing the bigger battle of flipping control of the state senate, was not a victory.
So, who is the real winner in last night's election? In the short term, the GOP, and gun owners, because Governor Terry McAuliffe got nothing for all of the money he spent from his PAC and that he convinced Bloomberg to spend to help him flip the Senate. We can thank the gun owners in Powhatan County for that.
“Amazing Powhatan turnout. Definitely Bloomberg backlash,” longtime Democratic political operative Paul Goldman said in a text message.
The Democrat made a massive mistake when he accepted campaign swag from an interest group affiliated with former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who seeks tougher gun control laws. Gecker might have lost anyway, but the Bloomberg intervention gave Powhatan voters a reason to rise up in indignation. Sturtevant also received funds from outsider sources but the Bloomberg connection vividly cast Gecker on the wrong side of an issue of vital concern to Powhatan’s citizenry. A campaign focused on guns redounded to Gecker’s despair. This is not a surprise.
From a gun owner perspective, we still can't override a McAuliffe veto of good 2nd Amendment related bills. And, as Brian Schoeneman wrote in his election post mortem on Bearing Drift, regarding the GOP, maintaining the staus quo is not really something to be popping the corks over.
We maintained the status quo. That’s it. In every seat that was held by the GOP, we won. In every seat held by the Democrats, we lost. A few of those State Senate seats were open seat races (whether through retirement or the primarying of an incumbent Republican), but they were also in heavily partisan areas, where the non-incumbent party had only a slight chance to pull off an upset (for example, the 8th, 11th, 12th, 29th, and 36th).
The two most competitive challenger races – at least by media standards – were the Nancy Dye/John Edwards battle in the 21st District, and the Frank Wagner/Gary McCollum battle in the 7th District. Neither of the challengers came close to unseating the incumbent, with both Edwards and Wagner winning by approximately 8 points.
Maintaining the status quo in the Senate was a must win, and we won it. But we gained no ground, and the millions poured into the Commonwealth by outside groups didn’t have an overall impact on the final outcome. In the two races they targeted, they went 1-1. The only people really pleased with that outcome should be the TV stations in Richmond and Northern Virginia.
Gun owners were challenged this election and with the exception of one race (remember the gun ban lobby originally targeted four seats) we won. Everytown and the national gun ban politicians are already trying to spin that one race as a major victory, which was expected. This election was a wake-up call to gun owners. Hopefully we heeded it and are prepared for war in 2016. That campaign starts today.
I had the opportunity to speak with NRANews Cam and Company host Cam Edwards about Tuesday's results:
With the campaign season winding down, candidates spent the weekend reaching out to voters. Governor Terry McAuliffe and U.S. Senator Mark Warner traveled the state in one last attempt to pick up the one state senate seat McAuliffe needs to take control of the State Senate. One of their stops was in the hotly contested 10th District for a rally at the headquarters of gun ban supporter Dan Gecker. Meanwhile, the Republican, Glen Sturtevant, was knocking on doors meeting with individual voters over the weekend. From the Richmond Times Dispatch:
With less than 48 hours before the polls open in one of Virginia’s most expensive and tightly contested Senate races ever, Democrat Daniel A. Gecker joined hands with Gov. Terry McAuliffe and U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner at a rally in Chesterfield County, while Republican Glen H. Sturtevant knocked on doors in Richmond’s Museum District.
McAuliffe capped a barnstorming tour of the state on behalf of Democratic Senate candidates Sunday in a joint appearance with Warner to boost voter turnout for Gecker, 59, a two-term member of the Chesterfield Board of Supervisors, and potentially give Democrats control of a nearly evenly split state Senate.
“We need one seat, and Dan Gecker is that seat,” the governor shouted to a cheering crowd of volunteers and state Democratic party leaders at Gecker’s field office off Buford Road in Chesterfield.
When Gecker spoke, he took the opportunity to say what issues he would push if elected, and he made sure to mention gun control.
Also during this final weekend, anyone listening to radio probably heard ads for or against Gecker and Sturtevant (I heard an ad paid for by NRA-PVF during the Rush Limbaugh program on Friday). In addition to the NRA-PVF radio warning of Bloomberg trying to buy the Virginia State Senate, Citizens for Responsible Solutions, the Gabby Giffords gun ban group had also bought $40,000 in radio time promoting Gecker.
Money has flooded the 10th District in the last couple of weeks. According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the largest outside expenditure in a State Senate race had been $250,000 on behalf of then-Sen. Jeannemarie Devolites Davis, R-Fairfax, in 2007. This year, four candidates have exceeded that amount, with Gecker and Democrat Jeremy McPike, who is battling Republican Hal Parrish for the seat open in the 29th Senate District being the largest beneficiaries.
But the stakes are much higher for gun owners this year than in 2007. The large expenditures for a single issue is being used as a test case. From the Times-Dispatch article referenced above:
“It’s kind of a test case on how the gun issue plays out in a competitive district,” said Robert D. Holsworth, a longtime political commentator on state and Richmond-area politics.
Holsworth continued later in the article:
Holsworth isn’t sure how the issue will affect Tuesday’s election in the 10th District. “Is this really going to help Dan Gecker, particularly with moderate suburbanites?” he asked. “On the other hand, does this spending backfire on him?”
But he added, “We’ve not seen this debated this way in the Richmond area” since then-Gov. L. Douglas Wilder teamed with then-U.S. Attorney Richard Cullen to get legislation passed in 1993 that restricted purchases of handguns to one a month. The assembly subsequently repealed the law in 2012 under then-Gov. Bob McDonnell.
Beyond next week’s outcome, Holsworth wondered, “How is this going to play in the national election? How is it going to play in Virginia in the presidential election?”
I spoke with someone associated with the Chesterfield County GOP over the weekend and he said he is hearing that voters on both sides are being turned off by the flood of ads and mailers and saying they are just going to stay home and not vote. Turnout will be key. Every gun owner in the 10th and 20th Districts need to go to the polls tomorrow and vote for Glen Sturtevant (10th) and Hal Parrish (29th). We don't want Bloomberg buying Virginia's State Senate.
The Glen Sturtevant campaign has new bumper stickers for the last 5 days of the campaign! Stop by their campaign headquarters to pick up your "Yes to Glen! No to Bloomberg!" bumper sticker! Put this bumper sticker on your vehicle and on the yard sign at your home! The Sturtevant office is located at 1520 Huguenot Road Suite 116 in Midlothian.
The campaign is also asking you to showyour support of Glen on your social media accounts! They supporters to help counteract some of the negative ads being bankrolled by Bloomberg. Grassroots support is worth more than big donations from out-of-state liberals. The Sturtevant Campaign would like supporters to download the Facebook cover photo below and post it on your account today!
To find out other ways you can help in the final days of the campaign, contact Tim Lagerman at 570-898-3160, or email him at Tim@nrailafrontlines.com.
NRA Board Members Tim Knight and Sean Maloney are traveling Virginia, talking one-on-one with voters about next week's elections and working to turn out the pro-rights vote in Virginia's 10th State Senate District. They stopped by the Farmville studio of NRANews and told Cam Edwards that many voters they speak with are aware of Michael Bloomberg's anti-gun spending in the state. While not discounting the affect that such a large dump of money can have, they told Cam that nothing replaces the personal engagement of knocking on doors.
If you live near the Richmond area, and can spare some time between now and November 3rd, please contact Tim Lagerman by email at Tim@nrailafrontlines.com or by phone at 570-898-3160.
The Washington Post reports this morning results of a new Post/ABC News Poll that shows respondants overwhelmingly (63 percent to 23 percent) say mass shootings reflect problems identifying and treating people with mental health problems rather than inadequate gun control laws. There does seem to be a disconnect between that view and whether new gun laws should be a priority however when that question was asked:
The survey finds that 46 percent say new laws to reduce gun violence should be a bigger priority, while 47 percent say it's more important to protect the right to own firearms. This marks a shift away from gun laws since April 2013, when Democrats' push for increased background checks fell short in the aftermath of the massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.; back then, a 52 percent majority said new laws should be a priority.
It will be interesting to see if the views of Virginia voters are similar to those of the people polled on November third. Bloomberg has invested heavily in two suburban districts (10th and 29th) hoping to turn the State Senate. While a small majority of people (52 %) in urban areas say new gun laws should be a bigger priority than protecting Second Amendment rights, that number dips to 45 percent in suburban areas. The poll shows women are 13 percentage points more likely to prioritize new gun laws than men. With that in mind, it is probably a good move on the part of the Glen Sturtevant (10th District) campaign to use women in their response to the Bloomberg ads. The new Sturtevant ad also mentions mental health.
VSSA urges all gun owners in the 10th District to contact the NRA-ILA campaign field rep, Tim Lagerman (Tim@nrailafrontlines.com or by phone 570-898-3160) to find out how you can help in the final two weeks of the campaign.
The Richmond Times Dispatch this morning came out with their editorial endorsements for the November 3rd General Election and Glen Sturtevant was one of the beneficiaries:
The retirement of Republican John Watkins opens the seat in the 10th District, which includes Powhatan as well as portions of Chesterfield and Richmond. We endorse Republican Glen Sturtevant who appears likely to embody the thoughtful independence that defined Watkins’ exceptional career. Sturtevant, a member of Richmond’s School Board, belongs to the GOP’s reform wing and stands in the philosophical mainstream. He supports changes to make merit the basis for judicial selection, would restrain governmental overreach and understands the role Virginia can play in national energy policy. His principal opponent, Democrat Dan Gecker, has served ably on Chesterfield’s Board of Supervisors and would prove a diligent senator. A close call was made easier when an outside group led by Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York City, decided to drop $700,000 into an effort to boost Gecker, whom it considers an ally in its pursuit of anti-gun laws. Voters in the 10th seem unlikely to embrace the cause or approve of outsiders meddling in their politics. Gecker would have enhanced his reputation if he scorned the dubious help. Marleen Durfee’s independent candidacy adds an outside voice to one of the state’s most competitive races. The results in the 10th could determine partisan control of the Senate. This stands as central Virginia’s most compelling assembly campaign in several cycles. Sturtevant would bring to the Senate the intellectual curiosity and temperamental moderation the GOP needs.
I have wondered if Bloomberg and McAuliffe overreached with the amount of money that was dropped into the 10th and 29th districts. The Times Dispatch thinks so. We'll see on November 3rd.
Not long after I spoke with Cam Edwards on NRA News yesterday about the $700,000 that Michael Bloomberg's Everytown for Gun Safety is dropping into the 10th State Senate District, the Washington Post reported that he is dropping over twice that amount - $1.5 million - in the 29th Senate District targeting GOP candidate Hal Parrish:
Less than two weeks before Election Day, Everytown for Gun Safety announced Thursday that it would spend $1.5 million in TV and online ads for Democrat Jeremy McPike. He is running against Manassas Mayor Harry J. “Hal” Parrish II (R) to succeed retiring Sen. Charles J. Colgan (D-Prince William).
A day earlier, Everytown said it would spend $700,000 on ads for Democrat Dan Gecker, who is battling Republican Glen Sturtevant to represent part of Richmond and the surrounding suburbs in the Senate. That seat is being vacated by retiring Sen. John C. Watkins (R-Powhatan).
The ad campaigns, featuring the father of a Roanoke TV journalist shot to death on the air in August, target the two seats considered most up for grabs in the 40-member Senate. Democrats need to pick up one seat to take control of the chamber and give Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) a chance for legislative success for the final two years of his term. The GOP enjoys an overwhelming majority in the House of Delegates.
The amount of money Bloomberg is dropping in is unprecedented. The money he is putting in for one candidate in the 29th is almost as much as both candidates have raised combined. It's all part of the anti-gun meme "Take out the NRA in their backyard". Governor Terry McAuliffe all but admitted he has been coordinating with Bloomberg's group, though he denied speaking to Bloomberg himself:
Asked at a public appearance Thursday outside Richmond if he had spoken with Bloomberg about the ad buys, McAuliffe said no. But he responded coyly when a reporter asked if he’d had any contact with Bloomberg’s “people.”
“Oh, I didn’t say that, but I haven’t talked to Mayor Bloomberg,” McAuliffe said.
By the way, it is not illegal in state races for campaigns to coordinate with outside groups.
Yes, it is possible for one rich asshole to buy power in our Republic if he has enough and is willing to spend enough to do it. Bloomberg seems able and willing. I’m sorry that’s the case, but it is just is. Grassroots is the only way we can counter it. But will it be enough? Will enough people step up?
NRA-ILA has a Campaign Field Representative, Thomas Bingham, on the ground in the 29th District to coordinate volunteer efforts for gun owners. You can contact him by email at Thomas@nrailafrontlines.com.
Sebastian makes a great point over on Shall Not Be Questioned talking about the gobs of money that Bloomberg is spending and how it likely tilted Oregon in his favor in this year's legislature:
Bloomberg’s anti-gun movement has been frustrated in many states, except Oregon has recently tilted in his favor. It should be no surprise, then, that Everytown outspend pro-gun rights groups 10 to 1 there too. The other side wants to talk about the well-funded “gun lobby,” but reality is that Bloomberg can outspend us election after election if he really wants to, and money talks. If we don’t match Bloomberg’s cash with real and sustained grassroots energy, he will end up being able to successfully buy legislation, as he succeeded doing in Oregon.
Will he get involved in the handful of state senate races in Virginia this year to try and get a victory here? We have the opportunity to match his money with grassroots activity. NRA-ILA has Campaign Field Reps in the handful of competitive senate districts this year. Please consider contacting them and volunteer to help the pro-rights candidate in your area. Our grassroots can beat Bloomberg's money.
The Washington Examiner reports that the nation's largest outdoor retailers, Bass Pro Shops and Cabela's are not buckling under to Bloomberg funded Everytown for Gun Safety's demand that they ignore the rules put in place by the Brady Act. Those rules allow an FFL to transfer a firearm to the buyer if the NICS has not denied the purchase with in 72 hours:
Under current FBI rules, the buyers are allowed to get their weapon after the third day, although the check for disqualifying information through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System will continue for a total of 90 days. It's a small number, however, since 91 percent of the background checks are completed instantly, surpassing the attorney general's own goal.
The Examiner also noted that even if a denial is received after the firearm has been transferred that there is a policy in place to recover the firearm from the purchaser. Add these to Kroger, another company that has not buckled to Bloomberg's bullying. All three businesses deserve the patronage of gun owners.
Gun control has a racist past. Some of the laws that still exist, like the one in North Carolina requiring a potential handgun purchaser to get the chief law enforcement officer in their locality to sign off on a permit to purchase a handgun were originally passed to make it harder for Blacks to purchase firearms. More recently, Mike Bloomberg made comments in February regarding getting guns out of the hands of young blacks that had it been made by a conservative Republican would have been all but crucified. But because it was Bloomberg, it barely made news.
“It’s controversial but, first thing is all of your, 95 percent, 95 percent of your murders and murderers and murder victims fit one M.O. You can just take the description and Xerox it and pass it out to all the cops. They are male minorities 15 to 25. That’s true in New York, it’s true in virtually every city in America. And that’s where the real crime is. You’ve got to get the guns out of the hands of the people that are getting killed.”
NRA Commentator Colion Noir addresses such thinking in a new video titled Black People Can Think Too. In the video, Noir states:
This race-baiting rhetoric is a disgusting attempt to take advantage of certain sensitivities. Yes, the inner cities’ young black men kill each other at an embarrassingly high rate, but instead of addressing the real issue, anti-gun politicians and the mainstream media would rather exploit the symptoms because there’s no money in the cure.
Take a look at the full video.
Update: Ater this was posted on Wednesday, Noir appeared on NRANews to talk more in depth about the video.
Paul Bedard reports in The Washington Examiner this morning that Bloomberg will unveil a new online news magazine with the goal to "change the conversation about guns in America."
Called The Trace, the website will track news about guns in the nation, but not necessarily parallel Bloomberg's pro gun-control views, according to insiders. It is not anti-gun, said one associate of the site.
In Washington, where the site will be unveiled at a preview party, some close to the startup said that backers will include Republicans and Democrats in a demonstration of its effort to promote "moderate" gun policy.
The invitation for the Tuesday night event, obtained by Secrets, reads: "Please join us for a preview of The Trace. The journalism startup dedicated to changing the conversation about guns in America."
It is difficult to count how many times Bloomberg has tried to "change the conversation" about gun control but it always ends up the same way - he trots out the same tired old proposals. This appears to be confirmed by the only media story about the new effort:
In the only story about The Trace, New York's "Capital" said the site will be the editorial arm of Bloomberg's Everytown for Gun Safety. The group draws attention to gun violence, builds protests against organizations and companies that don't ban guns in stores, and promotes background checks.
It's not anti-gun but is the editorial arm of an anti-gun group. Yeah, right.
It appears Bloomberg's gun ban groups have not given up on bullying Kroger to change their policy related to open carry of firearms in their stores. Forbes reports that Bloomberg's Everytown for Gun Safety and Moms Demand Action have joined together to released a video ad targeting Kroger that the groups plan to market online. They've also stood up a "microsite" called Groceries not Guns where supporters of the gun ban groups can enter the total of groceries purchased at Kroger competitors:
A representative of the two groups made it clear they’ll carry on pressuring Kroger until the supermarket chain agrees to ask customers to forgo their guns while grocery shopping. Their expenditure on this campaign is just shy of the $1 million mark to date.
Interestingly enough, of the competitors Moms Demand lists as alternatives to Kroger that I frequent (Costco and Target), I don't recall seeing signs posted regarding firearms in Virginia Costco and Target stores. Please continue to let Kroger know you appreciate them honoring the firearm laws of the states in which they do business.
While not surprising, but at the same time heartening, General Assembly GOP leaders were dismissive of Governor Terry McAuliffe's gun control proposals that he rolled out on Monday. Having said that, Virginia gun owners should not get complacent and should let their voice be heard. Contact your General Assembly members ahead of the January 14th opening of the 2015 session and let them know you oppose these proposals. Here are some great points, courtesy of NRA-ILA, that you can use when contacting your state legislators:
Attempting
to reimpose the ineffective one-handgun-per-month (gun rationing) restriction
that Virginia repealed in 2012.
It's obvious that McAuliffe and anti-gun leader Michael Bloomberg,
his political patron, are clearly out of touch with the views and priorities of
ordinary Americans on this issue. Last week's Pew Poll showed a majority of Americans believe owning a firearm makes you safer and it is more important to protect our firearm freedoms than to control the ownership of firearms. Gun rationing schemes are archaic and
ineffective. Like every gun control law, one-gun-a-month restrictions
only burden law-abiding citizens and do absolutely nothing to reduce violent
crime. Purchasers of firearms are already subject to criminal records
checks, and further and arbitrary control of these legal items does nothing but
unfairly burden Virginia’s law-abiding gun owners and sportsmen.
Seeking to arbitrarily strip some 9,000 Virginia
residents of their right to hold concealed handgun permits for falling behind
on child-support payments and pursuing prohibitions for people convicted of
certain misdemeanor crimes from possessing a firearm.
Being behind on child-support payments is not relevant to
your constitutional right to defend yourself and does not indicate that you are
a violent person or a danger to others. In many cases, individuals who
are behind on child support payments may have simply hit on hard financial
times and making it more difficult for them to defend themselves will only
compound their difficulties and offer no public safety benefit. Likewise,
misdemeanor offenses should not warrant the permanent loss of Second Amendment
rights. No other civil right is lost in the Commonwealth for conviction
of misdemeanor offenses. McAuliffe clearly wishes to treat the Right to
Keep and Bear Arms as a second class civil right.
Attempting to expand background checks.
Anyone engaged in the business of buying and selling
firearms for livelihood and profit must be federally licensed as a firearm
dealer (FFL) and thus there is no such thing as a “private vendor.” A gun
dealer must maintain a record of every firearm received from, or
transferred to, another person or dealer and any further expansions of the law
will have no impact on criminal activity. Today, gun
control activists like McAuliffe are trying to expand this system to all
firearm transfers at gun shows, under the banner of “universal” background
checks; an innocent sounding title for what should really be called “universal
registration.” What they won’t tell you is that no background check system
will ever be truly “universal” because criminals will not submit themselves to
such system and therefore their anti-gun approach once again singles out
individuals who are law-abiding citizens. The NRA opposes these
misleading proposals and will work diligently to defeat this legislation.
You can find your Delegate and State Senator by clicking here.
That's what columnist Ken Braun suggested in his article yesterday at MLive:
Following the release of this week’s election results, many big issues will be credited or blamed for altering the balance of power in Congress and state capitols. But despite the political and financial capital spent to the contrary, one issue that won’t leave much of a mark will be gun control. History may record the aftermath of this election as the era when stricter gun control advocates finally gave up.
He goes on to detail in the article reasons to back-up his theory. Things like the fact that when Gabby Giffords was making her rounds in nine states pushing gun control last month, not a single candidate appeared with her. Braun also noted that even Connecticut Governor Dan Malloy was in a tight battle with a candidate who was promising to repeal the gun bans that Malloy signed into law. The same with Governor John Higgenlooper in Colorado. Both Malloy and Higgenlooper prevailed in very tight races but Braun notes that neither incumbent ran on protecting the laws they signed. Braun spoke with Cam Edwards of NRANews.com yesterday and talked a little more in depth about his article and his theory.
I'm not quite convinced that gun control advocates have faced their final defeat, but I do think as a campaign issue, candidates have avoided it whenever possible for about 20 years. That's why Bloomberg's groups shifted tactics to strategies like they employed with Initiative 594 in Washington state. It is likely we are going to be facing ballot initiatives more often than candidates who run on gun control as an issue in future elections.
Breitbart has the story here. It seems while the former congresswoman is doing her best to make her push for gun control a central issue in the mid-term elections, she is having trouble getting candidates in tight races to join her:
In part by design, but also in recognition of the country's political landscape, not a single candidate in this year's midterm elections for statewide or federal office appeared with Giffords as she made her way from Maine to Washington state over 10 days.
Giffords has focused her activity on nine states, including Washington which has an initiative on the ballot that would make the act of an instructor handing a firearm to a student a crime without a background check. All you need to know about just how uphill her challenge is, is this quote:
"If this happened in March or December or any other time, we'd have asked other politicians to join," said Marti Anderson, an Iowa state lawmaker who helped organize a Giffords event in Des Moines. "But it's risky 15 days before an election."
While gun control ranks near the bottom of concerns for most voters this election, there are a few exceptions. Colorado and Connecticut, where major restrictions on the rights of gun owners were rammed through each legislature in response to the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting, have pro-rights activists energized to defeat both governors.
Groups like the one Giffords heads, and the multiple organizations Bloomberg funds have gobs of money but they don't have what the pro-rights community have; grassroots. Money is important but people vote. We are less than a week out for the election. Now is the time to double down on efforts to help those candidates who support us.
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