Wisconsin Anti-Gunners Try to Use Rahimi to Push Legislation

AP Photo/Philip Kamrass, File

The Rahimi decision is something of a trainwreck, to say the least.

I mean, there is the decision, then the fact that the justices couldn't even seem to really agree on much of anything about it beyond enough to make it an 8-1 decision.

Advertisement

But for anti-gunners, this is a big win, and we all know it's a big win for them. There's no pretending otherwise, in the grand scheme of things. We might debate just how much of a win it actually is, but it is what it is.

And sure enough, at least some are trying to take advantage of this in any way they can. For example, in Wisconsin...

Minkens and Jenna Gormal, the Wisconsin group’s public policy director, recently joined WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” to share their reactions to the decision and concerns about the current state of Wisconsin’s laws about domestic violence. 

Gormal said she knew that the state’s laws on gun access for recipients of domestic violence restraining orders would have remained intact even if the court’s decision last week had gone the other way. 

Still, Gormal worried how others in the future might contest her state’s laws on gun access for those accused of domestic violence.

“We’re lucky in Wisconsin that we have those protections,” she said. “But anything that happens federally … opens the door to further legal challenges.”

Gormal and Minkens advocated for closing what they called loopholes in state statute to protect potential victims. 

Minkens said some of the state’s laws about domestic violence should expand to be more inclusive of who is considered a victim or survivor. She said the laws protect people if they are a spouse, if they have lived in a home with the offender for a while or if they have a child together. She said some other relationships, such as teen dating relationships, “slip through the cracks.”  

Advertisement

The problem is that if there's no domestic situation, it kind of can't be domestic abuse. I mean, it's a pretty important requirement.

I'm not saying a boyfriend can't be abusive, but the cohabitation requirement means that there's at least some evidence of a relationship. It's not automatically a romantic one, but there's a firm line that must be crossed.

What these people are griping about is that people can't just declare to be in a relationship and then impact someone's right to keep and bear arms for the rest of their life. That's not how it's supposed to work.

And teens are notoriously stupid. While I won't excuse crossing the line and abusing their partner, they're also people who cannot and should not be treated like actual adults. Especially when it may create lifetime difficulties.

I know a lot of abusers are always going to be abusers. I also know that anyone who beats their partner is a pathetic piece of filth. 

But that doesn't have anything to do with Rahimi.

In fact, nothing here really is linked to that case, despite this supposedly being a reaction to Rahimi, literally none of this applied to him.

Advertisement

For one thing, he was under a restraining order when arrested on gun charges. He wasn't a teenager who reportedly smacked his girlfriend and was convicted of it.

The cases are entirely different.

But anti-gunners will use any opportunity. That's all that's happening here.

Join the conversation as a VIP Member

Sponsored