RECENT WAVE OF STATE-LEVEL GUN-CONTROL SCHEMES – WAS THIS A PUNT FROM THE WHITE HOUSE OR A STRATEGIC MOVE? (Our investigation, Part 1)
By John Peterson
An alarming trend is rearing its ugly head as we are seeing increasing attempts at state-level aimed firearms bans and confiscations, as well as renewal of previous gun-control attempts. We are investigating how this, the influence of recent massacres, and the possibility that the president’s action could have been a catalyst to set in motion a new wave of state-level gun control.
Firearms-owning and liberty-minded citizens in a number of states are now back on the defensive against renewed attempts to infringe upon their firearms civil rights. Adding to this is the highly publicized gun-control rally on March 24. Despite the vastly exaggerated claims about the size of the event and its true nature, the deceptively named and hyper-partisan “March For Our Lives” undoubtedly will influence some hearts and minds due to its oversaturation in the mainstream media. All of this in response to the two most recent mass shootings, the Las Vegas massacre of October 1, 2017, and the Parkland, Florida, school shooting. As we all well know, in addition to their ongoing efforts to chip away at our civil rights, the leftists/democrat party and their allies elsewhere in the establishment exploit periodic tragedies as a matter of standard practice. They are now invigorated like never before. Considering that these most recent tragedies were the highest fatalities for a mass shooting and second highest for a school shooting in U.S. history, the anti-gun forces see this as a golden opportunity to push their agenda like never before, despicable and unscrupulous as ever.
But, adding to this gun-control maelstrom is a chain of events in recent months that we have been tracking. This includes how the president has influenced the situation and a series of strong statements, proposals, reversals, and changes of venue for what and by whom any new firearms related legislation would be pursued. Gun owners across the country are alarmed.
Firstly, within hours of the Las Vegas shooting, it was pretty clear that new control would be pursued by the Trump Administration. Less than ten months earlier, both the White House and Congress rolled back some Obama-era restrictions on firearms purchases. However, beginning with the televised February 28 White House bipartisan roundtable with lawmakers, President Trump began to make some surprising (and even shocking) statements regarding a willingness to accept certain new gun control measures, as well as some mocking of certain lawmakers for being “afraid” or “petrified” of the NRA. Following the meeting, he met with the NRA leadership for a second time that week on March 1, then announcing three minutes after NRA-ILA’s Chris Cox did so on twitter: “Good (Great) meeting in the Oval Office tonight with the NRA!”
While this was going on, the first major “post-massacre” gun control was on its way to becoming law. The knee-jerk reaction
