National law enforcement organizations harshly criticized Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke's plan to send police officers to collect AR-15s and AK-47s from those who refuse to turn them in under his mandatory buyback scheme.
In interviews with the Washington Free Beacon, leaders from groups representing hundreds of thousands of law enforcement officers described Beto's gun confiscation plan as "ridiculous," "asinine," and likely unconstitutional.
Their comments come after Beto told MSNBC on Wednesday that he would send "law enforcement to recover" firearms from those who would not comply with his buy-back plan. O'Rourke vividly described the plan at September's Democratic primary debate, declaring that "hell yes, we're going to take your AR-15, your AK-47."
A leader of the National Fraternal Order of Police—the nation's largest police union, representing more than 330,000 sworn law-enforcement officers—said that not only was Beto's plan unlikely to be constitutional but that Beto himself was unlikely to ever be elected.
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AJ Louderback, the sheriff of Jackson County, Tex., said he and many other sheriffs would not follow orders to confiscate guns en masse.
"I think he's seriously misjudging the law enforcement response to what he wants to do," Louderback told the Free Beacon. "Many sheriffs would not comply with his plan."
Louderback sits on the immigration and government affairs committees of the National Sheriffs' Association, which represents over 3,000 sheriffs across the country. He described O'Rourke's plan as unworkable and counterproductive.
"This guy's plan is ridiculous," he said. "Everyone is looking for solutions to violent crime but this isn't one of them. I'm not going to harass my citizens for owning guns."
The National Association of Police Organizations, which represents over 1,000 police organizations with more than 240,000 sworn officers, said O'Rourke's plan would violate officers' constitutional oath.
"It's ironic that Beto O'Rourke, who was slamming police as ‘the new Jim Crow' just a year ago, now finds a need for police when he wants to disarm individuals," Bill Johnson, executive director of the group, told the Free Beacon. "Maybe poor Beto should spend less time live-streaming his visits to the dentist and attend a basics civics class instead. He'd be reminded that the very first law every police officer swears to uphold is the Constitution."
https://freebeacon.com/politics/police-groups-slam-betos-plan-to-send-cops-to-collect-americans-guns/
