It has been confirmed that the White House has reached out to Second Amendment Foundation and The Citizen’s Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) chairman Alan Gottlieb to discuss the “current debate over recent mass shootings.” Gottlieb confirmed the conversations, saying “we talked about everything from background checks to banning semi-automatic firearms and magazines to red flag laws”

“We went,” he said, “through everything that’s been proposed.

According to Gottlieb, the administration appeared receptive to possible ways existing proposals could be changed to address 2A supporters’ concerns.

“It was a very good, positive conversation,” he said, “They want to address the problems of violence in our society and at the same time protect Second Amendment rights- without doing just lip service or symbolism. They’re looking for proposals that could work and not eradicate people’s freedom.”

“I’m glad they reached out,” he said, “they want to find solutions to these violent acts in ways that do not attack Second Amendment rights. They know opponents of gun rights are not friends of the administration or the Constitution.”

“They understand the issue well, and know how important gun owners are to the 2020 election results.”

Gottlieb says he considered the questions “really good,” with a special interest in “what the gun rights community could support, and what it couldn’t support.”

While Gottlieb was encouraged at the conversations, he reminded us that “politicians are sensitive to public opinion polls, and the public wants to pass something even after admitting it would not stop mass murders.”

While we don’t yet have all the facts on the mass murder in Dayton, we do know a lot about about these kind of horrible acts and the people who commit them.

Modern mass killers generally display three traits: 1) they suffer from severe depression, 2) they feel socially isolated, 3) they are pathologically narcissistic, convinced that they have been wronged or cheated by society. So they lash out to harm as many people as they can as a form of revenge and as a way to be noticed and taken seriously.

They kill to become famous. Read more

A federal judge has ruled that the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit’s ruling that New Jersey Phil Murphy’s ban on 10-round magazines “reasonably fits the state’s interest in public safety.” Further, U. S. District Judge Peter G. Sheridan ruled the decision “resolves all legal issues in this case.”

The decision is seen as a crushing setback to the Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs’ efforts to have the ban overturned. The Third Circuit, Sheridan wrote, “has issued a prejudicial decision that resolves all legal issues in this case and there remains no genuine disputes of material fact.” No word from the Association as to whether they will continue to appeal to the United States Supreme Court- or if there remains a clear path for such an appeal. As the group’s executive director, Scott Bach, said in January, the law “turns one million people into criminal with the stroke of a pen.”

BELLEVUE, WA – The billionaire-supported gun prohibition movement has re-packaged its gun control agenda as a public health crisis, trying to convince the public that the cure to violent crime is to amputate the Second Amendment from the Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment Foundation said today.

“They couldn’t sell gun control as crime control,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “Then they couldn’t sell gun control as gun safety. Now they’re trying to convince the public that gun ownership is a public health issue.

“But this isn’t about public health,” he added. “This is all about politics. They’ve repackaged their agenda, but it’s the same old snake oil in a different bottle, and their strategy is right out of the gun control playbook.” Read more

SAF: ‘GUN-FREE ZONES ARE SHOOTING GALLERIES FOR MANIACS; END THEM’

BELLEVUE, WA – Declaring that so-called “gun-free zones are shooting galleries for maniacs,” the Second Amendment Foundation today is calling for an end to such designations by launching an advertising campaign aimed at print and online publications.

“Without a self-defense option,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb, “we are all at greater risk.”

The campaign has a simple message: “You’re a sitting duck in a gun-free zone.” The ad may be seen here.

Gottlieb referred to a report from the Crime Prevention Research Center that 98 percent of mass public shootings since 1950 occurred in places where citizens are prohibited from having firearms. He noted that in Europe, “every mass public shooting has occurred in a gun-free zone.” Read more

WASHINGTON — Yesterday, the Cato Institute and Firearms Policy Coalition announced their filing of an important amicus brief in the appeal of Aposhian v. Barr, a case challenging the federal bump-stock ban, at the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. The brief may be viewed at www.firearmspolicy.org/legal and https://www.cato.org/blog/again-pointing-out-executive-power-abuses-new-bump-stock-ban.

Cato and FPC argue in the brief that President Trump’s executive order banning bump stocks was arbitrary, capricious, and unconstitutional. As the court filing explains in detail, the Trump Administration disregarded the statutory definition of ‘machinegun’, a term used in both the National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA) and Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA), in order to comply with a presidential mandate to re-classify legal “bump-stock-type devices” as illegal automatic weapons. Further, the brief argued the ATF’s reversal on what constitutes an automatic weapon was based on political expediency and not statutory ambiguity.

What’s more, they argued, the bump-stock ban expands the ATF’s authority to bring more firearms into the NFA’s purview, placing an un-knowable number of gun owners in criminal peril.

“In effect, there is now a Damoclean sword over law-abiding Americans,” explained Cato and FPC in the brief. “What was legal yesterday can be illegal tomorrow.” In other words, this case extends far beyond just bump stocks, and has the potential to affect the future legality of just about anything protected by the Second Amendment. Read more

HARRISBURG, PA — The Pennsylvania State Supreme Court issued a significant 53-page majority opinion in the criminal appeal of Commonwealth v. Hicks. Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) and Firearms Policy Foundation (FPF) filed an important coalition amicus brief cited by the Court supporting Hicks in December of 2017, alongside Firearms Owners Against Crime (FOAC) and seven Members of Pennsylvania’s General Assembly. The Court’s decision, concurring opinions, and the FPC/FPF amicus brief can be viewed at www.firearmspolicy.org/legal.

At issue was whether someone’s carrying of a firearm could be used as reasonable suspicion of criminal conduct, and thus justification for police to conduct a “stop-and-frisk” of the gun owner. The court ruled in Hicks that such searches and seizures, in the absence of other evidence are completely unlawful.

The coalition’s brief, which was relied on heavily in the majority opinion, argued that the Pennsylvania and federal constitutions prohibit searches and seizures based on a suspicion of criminal activity due to carrying a firearm. According to the brief, “As protected by the Second and Fourth Amendments to the United States Constitution and [] the Pennsylvania Constitution . . . the mere open or conceal carrying of a firearm cannot establish reasonable articulable suspicion of criminal conduct, in the absence of additional indicia of unlawful activity.” Read more