Politico: Is Beto O'Rourke Hurting The Gun Control Crusade?

Beto O’Rourke’s campaign is floundering at the moment. Mired in the low single digits in polling, the candidate will release his third quarter fundraising figures today, and they’re not expected to be anything to write home about. Since his “campaign reset” to focus on gun control after the shootings at an El Paso Walmart, O’Rourke has re-invented himself as the gun control candidate in the 2020 Democratic primary, but while it’s led to increased media attention, it hasn’t amounted to a real boost for his campaign. It’s an open question as to whether or not he’s helped or hurt the gun control movement as well.

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In a new article for Politico, O’Rourke acknowledges that his “Hell yes we’re taking your AR-15” comment a few weeks ago may have made life more difficult for his fellow Democrats, but says the party hasn’t “caught up” to where the country is at the moment.

O’Rourke’s own proposal has been criticized as politically impractical or potentially unconstitutional. When CNN’s Chris Cuomo told O’Rourke last month that he doubted the legality of mandatory buybacks, O’Rourke replied that under the Second Amendment, “the government does have a power to regulate those kinds of weapons that are extraordinarily unusual or deadly.” He told Cuomo he is “willing to fight that one all the way to the end.”

The measure O’Rourke is proposing, he says, is not unlike laws banning any other illegal weapon or substance. “We don’t go door to door to enforce any part of the criminal code,” he told me, “nor would we in this case.” When asked whether penalties could include imprisonment, he said, “A fine, certainly. I don’t know about imprisonment. But it’s something that I’d like to listen to.”

What’s really amusing to me about O’Rourke making this argument is that he wants to legalize cannabis, in part because of the damage the ban has done to “communities of color” across the nation.

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“We need to not only end the prohibition on marijuana, but also repair the damage done to the communities of color disproportionately locked up in our criminal justice system or locked out of opportunity because of the War on Drugs,” O’Rourke said in a news release. “These inequalities have compounded for decades, as predominantly white communities have been given the vast majority of lucrative business opportunities, while communities of color still face over-policing and criminalization.”

If you think the War on Drugs has been a failure, it’s really odd to cite it as an example of how your gun ban would be enforced. Yet that’s exactly what O’Rourke is doing here. And it’s not only Beto’s gun and magazine ban that would impact young minority males. His national licensing plan would also likely fall mainly on young black men in deep blue Democrat-controlled cities, and he’s also endorsed the March For Our Lives Peace Plan, which seeks to reduce the number of legally owned firearms in the United States by 30% or more. In fact, the Peace Plan calls for a “re-examination” of the Heller decision, and if that decision were ever overturned, cities across the country would feel empowered to enact sweeping gun bans like the one struck down in the Heller decision.
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O’Rourke tells Politico that he can’t imagine running for another political office if he’s not successful in his presidential run. He may be setting himself up to head up a gun control group after his campaign is over, because I honestly don’t see a path to victory for O’Rourke. It’s clear he and other gun control advocates do see a path to victory as far as their gun control agenda is concerned, even if it doesn’t happen with Beto in the White House.

 

 

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