After pulling a politically timed stunt in order to change the media narrative on the Northam blackface/KKK scandal, Virginia Democrats were livid as the Republican-led General Assembly calmly demurred the 26 gun control proposals proffered during the special session, giving them to the Virginia Crime Commission so that stakeholders and law enforcement professionals could ascertain their efficacy.
From The Hill:
“Republican Senators and Delegates showed today they are cowards who could give a damn about keeping Virginians safe from gun violence. They ran away from their jobs at a time when Virginians needed them most,” the Virginia Democratic Party said in a statement following the end of the session.
“We will make sure on November 5th that their 90 minutes on the floor today are their last 90 minutes in the majority,” the party added.
Meanwhile, most mainstream observers were shocked at the lengths that the Democratic gun control legislation would go, up to and including gun confiscation in one bill submitted by Delegate Mark Levine (D-Fairfax).
In fact, not only would the bill require Virginians to turn in their firearms, the bill would have charged every Virginian still in possession of a banned firearm with a Class 6 felony.
What types of firearms did Levine’s bill encompass? Olympic style shooting competition pistols, for instance, would run afoul of the Democratic gun confiscation provisions specifically because the magazine is not in the pistol grip — thus turning future Virginia Olympians into felons.
To make matters worse, Levine’s gun confiscation bill was not a one-off lark by a renegade legislator. In fact, Levine’s speech on the House floor was lustily applauded by the Virginia Democratic legislators; a bill that would have made Olympians felons, folks.
Of course, no one in their right minds has any illusions that a political religion that actively destroyed a 17-year old kid’s reputation for “smirking” should be trusted with firearm confiscation. All the more reason why deliberation and consensus matter in a legislative process, and more evidence as to why Virginians simply do not trust Democrats with our constitutional rights — 2A or 1A.
Instead, perhaps we need a deliberate and thoughtful process like the Virginia Crime Commission to review and discuss such ideas rather than cramming through a bunch of extreme and ill-considered bills in order to rescue a political narrative?
After all, the Democrats were experts in gun confiscation in their past. Ask the folks in white hoods about what a free man with a gun does to a mob.
