New York has been trying to give California a run for its money in the race to be the state most hostile to the right to keep and bear arms. Gov. Kathy Hochul hasn’t exactly changed course from her predecessor’s anti-gun agenda and seems to be trying to double down on it.

Meanwhile, crime in New York has continued to grow and become a significant problem, one that many there are less than pleased with.

NSSF’s Larry Keane has some thoughts regarding these two data points.

More than half of New Yorkers now believe their state is in decline and won’t get better soon. Go figure, crime is listed as the Number2 reason for the reported despair – behind only the cripplingly high cost of living. Recent events have led to a surge in crime leaving countless New Yorkers feeling susceptible to the violent wills of criminals.

The feelings aren’t political either, as according to a new Siena College poll there’s wide agreement among each party affiliation – Republican, Democrat and Independent – that violent crime remains a serious issue. At least 64 percent of each respective group says so.

“In assessing the severity of problems facing New York, there is, surprisingly, considerable agreement among Democrats, Republicans and independents,” Siena College poster Steven Greenberg said of the findings.

Unfortunately, there’s some bad news-good news, though, for residents of the Empire State who want to exercise their right to defend themselves with a firearm as things are likely getting a lot worse before they get any better.

You see, this is a state that has basically taken a soft-on-crime approach, then pretended that crime isn’t really a factor, that people have no reason to be concerned about what is happening in their state.

From the local politicians to Hochul and other state-wide officials, the trend seems to be to take it easy on criminals and then make it more difficult on law-abiding citizens, many of them minorities, to protect themselves when they feel the state is letting them down.

Chris Cheng, who testified in the U.S. Senate in 2021 about the historic rise in minority gun ownership, stated it plainly when he testified before Congress.

“The past year-and-a-half or so with COVID-19 has been a pressure cooker… When you couple that with calls to defund the police and taking law enforcement officers off the street… it makes citizens like me less safe,” Cheng said. “If I can’t have law enforcement there, then it is a rational conclusion that individual citizens like myself would opt to utilize my Second Amendment right to purchase a firearm and use that firearm in lawful and legal self-defense,” he testified.

While it’s been a couple of years since Cheng said that, the situation hasn’t really changed all that much, now has it?

For folks in places like New York, though, there are things they can do. First, they need to understand that their right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right, one that can help them protect themselves and others. The police might want to protect you, but they can’t be everywhere all at once. As such, protecting you and yours is on you, and the Second Amendment helps with that.

They also need to recognize that voting for these soft-on-crime politicians isn’t helping. It’s simply turning jail cell doors into revolving ones, putting dangerous criminals back on the streets with frightening speed.

And I have good news for them, too. It’s often the exact same politicians trying to empower criminals and keep you from buying guns. Voting them out solves both of those issues.

Add in the fact that I can easily make the case that the cost of living complaints being made by New Yorkers is also, at least in part, the result of policies supported by these same officials an it’s an easy fix.

The question is whether folks there will ever do it.