The United States Marshals Service goes after some of the worst people in this country. They’re the guys who go after the fugitives and serve federal arrest warrants.

They see some of the worst this nation has to offer.

So, if gun control proposals worked as advertised, you’d think US Marshals would be those most interested in backing them.

And yet, in Maryland, one is taking issue with the proposed ban on unserialized firearms.

However, the impact of the proposed ghost gun ban is being questioned by those on the front lines of the crime war.

“If you eliminated all ghost guns you’re still going to have a big crime problem,” said U.S. Marshal Johnny Hughes.

…

Hughes believes the only action which will have an impact on the city’s soaring homicide rate, is focusing on the users of illegal guns instead of the guns themselves.

“The gun doesn’t shoot people, it’s the violent offender pulling the trigger who we need to go after,” said Hughes.

Now, Hughes isn’t saying anything I haven’t said a thousand times at a minimum. However, he’s not so easily dismissed as just some gun nut or reactionary or whatever they want to use to describe me inaccurately.

He’s a law enforcement professional who is going to be facing these people in the real world. He’s not some ivory tower academic who is detached from the realities of their proposals.

If he thought it would do any good, he’d have plenty of reason to say so.

The fact that he hasn’t is particularly interesting to me.

Of course, he’s also correct.

Look, people in cities like Baltimore were getting guns before homemade firearms were really a significant thing. This was before kits and 3D printers and such were commonplace. Baltimore has long had a history as a rough city.

Bad people will get whatever guns they can. While some might be obtaining unserialized firearms, that’s because that’s what’s offered up for sale. Remove those and it’ll be some other firearm instead. That’s just how the illegal arms trade works.

Our US Marshal here knows that. He knows it and understands it.

That’s far more than some lawmakers–people who consider themselves oh-so-learned about the world–have managed to figure out.

Hughes is, as the above-linked article phrased it, on the front lines. He sees the truth, a truth that anti-Second Amendment legislators refuse to see.

I see it, though. So do many of you.

Criminals, by their very nature, will break the law. Once you understand that new laws won’t stop something that previous laws failed to prevent, you understand that the laws themselves are pretty much useless. Instead, you focus on the bad guy and take him off the streets, rather than punish law-abiding citizens who like to build their own firearms for fun.

We don’t stop people from building their own cars, yet motor vehicles kill more people every year than firearms.

It’s time to stop the stupidity and put time and treasure into a direction that will actually accomplish something.