The midterm elections are 98 days away. Instead of working to pass the conservative agenda they promised, GOPers are moving as far to the left as they can in the hopes that they'll be able to hold onto their seats.
They're prioritizing their careers over the needs and wants of the American people.
Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell have promised to do everything they can to help them swing left. We see it in the GOP's attempt to block the border wall funding.
Now we are seeing it on gun control.
Rep. John Katko (R) represents upstate New York. He has an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association. He has built his entire career around a promise to protect the 2nd Amendment.
Katko just announced he is introducing new gun confiscation legislation. Not only does he have Democrats on board, but the GOP leadership has promised to hold a vote on it!
Katko's plan isn't all that different from what the Left has been pushing for years. He wants to use the power of the Federal government to help state and local police confiscate firearms from American citizens without them even being charged with a crime.
The founders added the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution to make sure that the right to keep and bear arms would not be infringed upon.
It is deliberately hard to lose your 2nd Amendment rights. You would need to (1) be convicted of a felony or domestic violence misdemeanor, (2) be involuntarily admitted to a mental hospital against your will, (3) adjudicated mentally defective by a court, (4) become a fugitive from justice, (5) relinquish your US citizenship, or (6) receive a dishonorable discharge from the military.
That's why gun ownership is a right and not a privilege. The government cannot just suspend people's rights without due process or a good reason.
Rep. Katko's plan would help state and local police to confiscate guns from people they think are dangerous, but don't have enough evidence to charge them with a crime. This is a big deal.
The bill would allow family members, friends, neighbors, and even perfect strangers to turn people into the police to have their guns taken away. A judge would decide on whether to authorize the confiscation, but the gun owner wouldn't even be told about the hearing. Once the citizen's 2nd Amendment rights are suspended, it would be then be up to the gun owner to prove they deserve the right to own guns.
This entire premise turns the principles of American justice upside down. Instead of Americans being innocent until proven guilty, this would presume gun owners guilty until proven innocent. The 2nd Amendment was written specifically to protect us from this!
Growing up, I had a family member who had to go through something like this. My great uncle was a hunter and gun collector. When his marriage went sideways, his wife lied to police that he was threatening to attack her. The police seized my uncle's gun collection 'out of an abundance of caution,' even though he was never convicted of, let alone charged with, a crime.
When the divorce made it to court, the judge still refused to give the guns back to him. There was no evidence of a crime and he had done nothing wrong, but the judge awarded the guns to the wife in the settlement. Being the vengeful woman she was, she promptly sold the gun collection off for pennies on the dollar. To this day, when he goes to buy a gun, he is still flagged by the background check system even though he did absolutely nothing wrong.
If this bill passes, it will be abused. Gun owners' rights will be violated. The Constitution will be trampled on.
And apparently, the confiscation bill has all the support necessary to pass!
After the Parkland shooting, Florida passed a similar bill to make it easier for law enforcement to take away innocent Americans' guns. When the bill was signed into law, we were promised that gun confiscations would be rare and limited.
Since it went into effect in March, more than 450 gun owners have been targeted. Many of them were never convicted and never even charged with crimes. They were disarmed based upon nothing but hearsay.
The right to keep and bear arms doesn't exist if people can be disarmed without even being charged with a crime.
Congressional Republicans are radically swinging left. Already this year, we have seen "pro-gun" Congressmen and Senators swing hard left in favor of gun control.
More than a dozen Republicans have signed onto the Democrats' new assault weapon ban. Two dozen -- including Rep. Katko -- have signed onto the plan to disarm millions of Americans between the ages of 18- and 20-years old.
The GOP is looking for a "compromise." They believe that compromise is confiscating Americans' firearms without due process!
Every time there is a gun control push, the Left says that gun owners need to "compromise." Over the years, they have demanded background checks, gun bans, ammunition restrictions, and every time, we were told to count our lucky stars that we got to keep our firearms at all.
But what is the compromise? What do gun owners get in return? Absolutely nothing. The compromise is that the left will only ban some guns and not all of them.
But now, they're not even pretending anymore. Now, they're openly pushing to create a nationwide gun confiscation program.
The last few weeks have proven that most Republicans in office are cowards. They are willing to say and do anything to get re-elected. This year, they actually believe they need to push gun control to win.
It really is now or never. If this plan goes through and a Federal gun confiscation program is created, there will be no coming back.
Fight back,
Joe Otto
Conservative Daily
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