CO Gun Rights Group Vows To Track Red Flag Law Victims

Red flag laws are controversial, to say the least.

In theory, some argue they shouldn’t be. After all, you’re talking about taking guns from the hands of potentially dangerous people while leaving everyone else alone. No one wants dangerous people to be armed, after all, so why is this an issue?

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Well, it’s an issue because the criteria are so pathetic as to be non-existent, really. Anyone who fits into the appointed group–which always includes family, by the way–can say you’re dangerous and a judge who has never laid eyes on you a day in his life will basically take their word for it and take your guns away.

All because your anti-gun sister said Elizabeth Warren would ban guns when she was elected and you said, “Come and take them” or some similar scenario. Other folks will think you’re a danger

Now, a Colorado gun-rights group is planning on keeping track of the uses of red flag laws to disarm Second Amendment supporters.

At a rally at the Colorado state Capitol Saturday morning, a gun rights group asked people to report if they are “red flagged” come 2020.

The new law allows a family member or law enforcement official to petition a court to temporarily remove guns for up to a year from someone who appears to pose a danger to themself or others.

“We are going to be tracking everything about them,” said Lesley Hollywood, the founder of the group Rally For Our Rights, which hosted the event. “We’ll be tracking which judges are ordering these so come time to elect the judges out, we can do that, too.”

She said the group is going to have resources for attorneys and mental health professionals about the law and will not let her rights be taken away.

“We will not comply with laws that infringe on our right to keep and bear arms,” she said. “It is downright dangerous. It’s unconstitutional.”

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Well, she’s right.

Frankly, I’m glad to see Rally For Our Rights stepping into this important role. More importantly, though, I challenge other gun rights groups in states with red flag laws to do the same.

We need to see the irreparable harm being to law-abiding gun owners for the simple “sin” of not necessarily conforming to what other people demand of them. I’ve been that guy deemed “dangerous” by a group simply because I had an interest in firearms. Luckily, there was no mechanism like a red flag law for those people to disarm me, but that was then.

Today, things are different and people can be disarmed because other folks are uncomfortable. Nevermind that I would easily have taken a bullet for anyone in that group and my hope was that if they ever saw my gun, it was because I was deploying it to save a life. They were just hat weirded out by the fact that someone actually liked guns.

So I’m a little touchy on the subject of red flag laws. I really am.

Good on Hollywood and her crew for stepping up.

Now I want to know who else is going to follow her lead?

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