In pushing for his first-in-the-nation gun control law requiring gun owners to pay a fee and purchase insurance, San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo said a lot of things. Of course, he actually thinks such a law will actually accomplish something, which really should disqualify him from future elections. After all, we tend to prefer the delusional not to hold public office in this country, though looking at Congress, we can see how often it happens.

However, one thing Liccardo promised would be a part of the new anti-Second Amendment effort would be a gun buyback. In theory, this would enable people who can’t comply with the new law’s requirement to get rid of their guns lawfully without the “risk” of someone else buying the gun and doing bad things with it or something.

The problem is, that buyback isn’t anywhere in sight.

A final vote on San Jose’s first-in-the-nation gun control measures is weeks away, but one of its promised provisions is—as of yet—nowhere to be found.

While the City Council approved a handful of measures in June, a promise to hold more gun buyback events—where gun owners are able to turn in unwanted firearms in exchange for cash—is still on the horizon with no set date. The already approved gun control measures include requiring all gun shops in the city to audio and video record all firearm purchases.

As part of Mayor Sam Liccardo’s gun control plan first unveiled in 2019 after the mass shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival and revived just weeks after the May 26 mass shooting at a VTA light rail yard, Liccardo proposed gun buyback programs.

Right. Because the killer really wanted to give up his guns instead of slaughtering the coworkers he’d talked about killing for some time but he couldn’t because there were no gun buyback events that would let him do that.

Seriously, do these people listen to themselves?

Then again, it’s not like anything else Liccardo has proposed would have done a damn bit of good, either. That’s about par for the course for the laws that pop up in the aftermath of a mass shooting. They make it look like the politicians are doing something without them having to actually do anything. Instead, they float out a number of measures and then pat themselves on the back.

Usually, those measures are things anti-Second Amendment types wanted anyway. All the mass shooting does is provide a pretext for those laws being introduced. It’s not about stopping a mass shooting, it’s about taking your rights away and trying to convince you to thank them for the effort.

But what about the gun buybacks?

Honestly, San Jose is better without them. Studies have shown they don’t actually accomplish anything on their own. The only one that found any benefit said that they worked in conjunction with other programs to mitigate violent crime. That’s not what Liccardo has been pushing, though.

If San Jose drops the buybacks–which are terribly misnamed since the government likely never owned those guns in the first place–they can use that taxpayer money on something else.

Of course, it’s not like we can trust certain politicians to be good stewards of the taxpayers’ money in the first place, so I suspect the buybacks will happen sooner or later.

As of right now, though, the people of San Jose may be getting a bit antsy. Liccardo should probably do something to address those concerns rather than just pat himself on the back for doing what few other Democrats have managed to do–punish people for trying to exercise their Second Amendment rights.