The choice of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as running mate for Vice President Kamala Harris may seem like a coupling made in heaven within the establishment media, but it could bring out the gun voters in numbers not seen since Democrats lost Congress back in 1994.
If not, then gun owners who are now burning up bandwidth just might be hot air. Then, again, they may have plenty about which to fume after the Democrats convene in Chicago later this month.
Harris is already trying to backtrack—i.e. change her tune—on the “mandatory buyback” she proposed while on the campaign trail back in October 2019, as detailed in the Austin American-Statesman by Amy Sherman at PolitiFact.com.
In an effort to explain Harris’ softening, Sherman takes a whack at Donald Trump’s assertion that Harris would take people’s guns. She writes, “The phrase ‘gun confiscation’ is broad and could lead voters to think that Harris wants to confiscate all guns from law-abiding owners. That’s not what she has said.”
True: She said, “mandatory buyback.” That translates to “compensated confiscation.” It amounts to the same thing, and American gun owners know it.
Here’s what Harris said: “We have to have a buyback program, and I support a mandatory gun buyback program. It’s got to be smart, we got to do it the right way. But there are 5 million (assault weapons) at least, some estimate as many as 10 million, and we’re going to have to have smart public policy that’s about taking those off the streets, but doing it the right way.”
There is no “right way” to confiscate privately held firearms, even with financial compensation.
Walz, meanwhile, has drifted from “darling” of the National Rifle Association—as noted by Forbes—to an “F”-rated politician. His swing to being a gun control advocate is described by Forbes, as favoring “gun control reforms.” Minnesota gun owners are not too keen on these “reforms,” and one can comfortably predict residents of the North Star State will make that abundantly clear on social media over the next few months. The election is less than 90 days away.
Walz—described in a headline by News Nation as a “reform champion”—argues that “basic gun safety isn’t a threat to my rights.” Pushing to ban an entire class of firearms may not be a threat to Walz’ rights, but many of his constituents see it is a threat to their rights.
MSNBC is trying to portray Walz as “the gun lobby’s worst nightmare.” It might be the other way around on Nov. 5, when Walz’ support for restrictive gun laws brings “gun voters” out of their traditional lethargy to prevent him from becoming the next vice president.
The New York Times recalls how Walz was once mentioned in Guns & Ammo as one of the Top 20 politicians for gun owners. That was a short-lived romance, it appears, despite his being a “rare gun-owning Democrat who spoke of his love for hunting.”
Perhaps the problem Democrats, and their media cheerleaders, have is their failure to “get it” that the Second Amendment is not about hunting. It is, as spelled out, about the “security of a free state.”
When she accepted the vice presidential slot from Joe Biden, Harris took ownership of the Delaware Democrat’s expansive gun control agenda. It has been scrubbed from the Internet, but thanks to Vox, the details are still available. It included “universal background checks” and a ban on “assault weapons.”
Back in 2019, when he was on the campaign trail, CNN noted how Biden vowed to push for a gun ban if elected, and he has done exactly that, unsuccessfully. He, or one of his PR people, even authored an OpEd in the New York Times in August 2019. He wrote, “We have a huge problem with guns. Assault weapons — military-style firearms designed to fire rapidly — are a threat to our national security, and we should treat them as such. Anyone who pretends there’s nothing we can do is lying — and holding that view should be disqualifying for anyone seeking to lead our country.”
Harris has never strayed from Biden’s gun ban effort. What was Joe’s is now Kamala’s and, by association, Tim’s.
On the subject of Second Amendment rights, a Harris presidency would be no different than the Biden presidency, although the effort might be more streamlined since Democrats have learned from their past failures. Walz might even become the administration’s front man on gun control.
Ask someone in Minnesota how that might work out.
About Dave Workman
Dave Workman is a senior editor at TheGunMag.com and Liberty Park Press, author of multiple books on the Right to Keep & Bear Arms, and formerly an NRA-certified firearms instructor.
