The gun and magazine bans endorsed by Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz failed to make it out of a House committee on Tuesday afternoon, but the legislation could still be introduced as an amendment to any bills that hit the House floor this session.
After Tuesday's hearing in the House Public Safety committee, where HF 3433 and HF 3402 failed to pass on a 10-10 vote, angry anti-gun activists lashed out at MN Gun Owners Caucus Director of Government Relations and Advocacy Anna Learny, who had testified in opposition to the gun and magazine ban legislation just a few minutes earlier.
Anna did an amazing job.
— MN Gun Owners Caucus (@mnguncaucus) February 24, 2026
Unfortunately, after the hearing, a small group of gun-control activists surrounded her and began berating her. One woman, wearing an Annunciation shirt, started screaming in her face and repeatedly called her a “smug bitch.”
That’s not civic… https://t.co/bAbfAbBXPi
Fox 9 in Minneapolis also reported that Rob Doar, President of the MN Gun Owners Law Center, was "confronted" by some parents whose children were present at the shooting at Annunciation church last August. Video of that confrontation shows Doar surrounded by a semi-circle of individuals, and though the audio is difficult to make out it appears that most of the back-and-forth was at least somewhat civil. That was certainly the case with Doar, who can be seen offering a business card to one anti-gun activist and offering to talk with him one-on-one.
Disgraceful. In 17 years at the #mnleg, I was never subjected to this kind of attack. Anna faced it in her first week.
— Rob Doar (@robdoar) February 24, 2026
They didn’t just disagree with her, they clearly targeted a young woman and tried to bully her into silence.
We used to discuss policy. They made it personal. https://t.co/TmM1scRSC8
So what did Learny say to make the anti's so incensed? Well, you can watch her testimony below, but I didn't hear anything other than someone offering sympathy to the parents, students, and faculty at Annunciation, while also pushing back on the notion that banning commonly owned arms and magazines would actually prevent mass shootings in the future.
MN House Public Safety - 2/24/2026: MNGOC Director Anna Leamy testifies against HF 3402 & HF 3433
— MN Gun Owners Caucus (@mnguncaucus) February 25, 2026
On February 24, 2026, Anna Leamy, Director of Government Relations and Advocacy for the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus, testified before the House Public Safety Committee in opposition… pic.twitter.com/u0VspErxcN
I guarantee if Doar or Learny had called any of the group from Annunciation who were there to support the bills a "smug bitch", it would have been a huge news story for Minneapolis media. But since it was a gun control advocate, and one who might have been personally impacted by the Annunciation shooting, the media couldn't be bothered to report on what Learny was subjected to.
The Democrats pushing HF 3433 and HF 3402 did themselves no favors during Tuesday's hearing by limiting proponent testimony solely to parents of Annunciation children and one physician who helped treat those who were injured in the mass shooting last August. Their statements were emotionally powerful, to be sure. You'd have to be pretty cold-hearted not to be impacted by a mother grieving the loss of her child, or the mom who detailed the ongoing physical and emotional toll of the shooting on her young son.
But laws shouldn't be based on emotion alone, and even sponsors of the legislation admitted that these bans, if enacted, might not prevent future acts of mass violence. Learny, Doar, and Advancing America's Freedom's Amy Swearer all expressed their sympathies to the families who were present, but they also pointed out the flawed rationale and legal problems with banning semi-automatic long guns and magazines that can hold more than ten rounds.
Swearer, for instance, pointed out that the vast majority of multi-victim shootings in Minnesota do not involve "assault weapons," and many of them are committed by individuals who are already legally prohibited from possessing any firearms due to previous convictions.
In this video, @AmySwearer from @AmericanFreedom testifies in the MN House Public Safety Hearing on February 24, 2026, in opposition to the two gun ban bills: HF 3433 (Semi-Auto Gun Ban) and HF 3402 (Magazine Ban).
— MN Gun Owners Caucus (@mnguncaucus) February 25, 2026
After having originally been denied the ability to testify and… pic.twitter.com/lgm0Yk0lUh
Swearer's testimony is so good I can't quote just one portion of it. You should listen to every second of what she had to say.
The gun control activists on hand yesterday clearly didn't want to hear the hard truths that she, Doar, and Learny delivered, but that doesn't make their testimony false, deceptive, or written by "the gun lobby."
Scapegoating lawful gun owners for the actions of evil individuals won't make us any safer. Quite the opposite. Sacrificing our right to armed self-defense in the name of public safety just puts more people at risk of harm by violent actors who couldn't care less about whether or not they're violating a gun control law while they're committing mass murder.
Go after repeat, violent offenders. Fix Minnesota's broken mental healthcare system. Improve school security, including school resource officers and armed staff. And recognize that In a nation with more than 400 million firearms and the right to keep and bear them there is no way we're going to ban our way to safety.... even by criminalizing the exercise of that fundamental right.
Editor’s Note: The radical left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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