Whether it's ignorance or fabrication, the truth of the matter is that anti-gunners routinely espouse a belief that the firearm industry is responsible for violent, gun-related crimes.
Back in the day, lawsuits against gun manufacturers were common. Anti-gun groups routinely funded suits that tried to place the blame for violent crime on companies like Smith & Wesson, Ruger, etc. The PLCAA was passed in response to that because they were trying to hold manufacturers responsible for what third parties did, creating massive costs to these companies for things that were beyond their control.
That died down a fair bit as lawsuits were tossed, but when Remington's insurance company settled with Sandy Hook families, rather than continuing the defense, the end result was that it sparked a new wave of attempts to punish gun companies for having the nerve to sell guns.
In Virginia, in and amongst all of the gun control bills being pushed, there's the Gun Industry Accountability Act, which seeks to put the firearm industry on the hook once again, and one state senator's post on X makes it pretty clear how clueless she and her fellow supporters of this measure actually are.
đźš«NOT now,
— Sen. Jennifer Carroll Foy (@JCarrollFoy) February 9, 2026
đźš«NOT in Virginia,
đźš«NO industry is above the law.
With great power comes great responsibility. The gun industry must play a part in reducing gun violence.
Read the full bill: https://t.co/OBhFCn5SNl pic.twitter.com/RxpYCIgd9a
The thing is, no one has ever said the gun industry is above the law. The PLCAA may offer the industry immunity from certain lawsuits, but it doesn't protect them from breaking the law, including state gun control laws. Let's pretend there's a company called Guns-R-Us and they make guns. If they sell AR-15s that are illegal in California to California residents, they can be held accountable for that. If they ship a gun to a non-FFL in violation of federal law, they can be held accountable for that, too.
What Guns-R-Us can't be held accountable for, though, is making a gun that is perfectly legal under all federal laws, selling it to distributors who then pass it on to gun stores where the gun is legal to be sold, and then it gets used in an illegal act by someone who stole it from a lawful purchaser.
Because that's a lot of what Foy is pushing here.
The bill in question tries to get around the PLCAA's protection by using vague "public nuisance" language, blaming companies for what bad people do, all in an effort to open the door for lawsuits that anti-gunners such as her think will eventually drive gun manufacturers and retailers completely out of the state.
They don't have to ban any kind of guns if they just make it untenable for anyone to want to engage in the lawful sale of firearms.
Anything they decide constitutes a public nuisance suddenly becomes the manufacturers' responsibility, but as we also know from Mexico's attempts at suing the firearm industry, the firearm industry is kept in the dark about a lot of stuff that lawmakers become privvy to, which means prosecutors and anti-gun organization will learn about "nuisances" they can then leverage to go after these companies without them even being aware there's an issue.
Yet if it were really about blaming companies for public nuisances their products create, then where are the laws going after the auto industry? Why aren't Honda and Toyota being held responsible for street racing on our city streets?
Maybe it's because they don't care about public safety or public nuisances at all. They just want to find a way to justify an anti-gun jihad, and they're justifying it with a fantasy that claims the gun industry is different than anyone else who sees their products misused.
Editor’s Note: The radical left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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