Gun Controllers Try to Hide Joe Biden’s Anti-gun Extremism

[Elderberry]

NRA-ILA Monday, September 14, 2020

With Fall 2020 upon us it is time again for gun control advocates’ quadrennial tradition – dishonestly attempting to convince voters that a brazenly anti-gun presidential ticket does not pose a threat to gun owners. This year the deception is again being backed by longtime Massachusetts anti-gun advocate and wealthy businessman John Rosenthal. Despite both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s advocacy for gun confiscation and a host of other draconian gun measures, in a piece for Newsweek with the farcical title, “Individual Gun Ownership Is Not at Stake in This Election,” Rosenthal claimed “[p]rivate gun ownership for responsible citizens will remain unchanged” during a Biden presidency. The piece is in the same vein as others that have lied about the ticket’s anti-gun aims.

First, a little background is instructive. Rosenthal is the founder of Massachusetts-based gun control group Stop Handgun Violence. Founded in 1994, the group has worked to make the Bay State’s onerous gun control laws even more oppressive.

The organization is best known to the rest of the country for its billboard along a stretch of the Massachusetts Turnpike frequented by those who use Boston’s Logan Airport. At various times the billboard has called for the criminalization of private firearm transfers, a federal ban on commonly-owned semi-automatic firearms, and attacked NRA.

Aimed at an out-of-state audience, the billboard has been used to chastise neighboring New Hampshire, Maine, and Vermont for a perceived lack of gun control and to laud Massachusetts for its comparatively draconian measures. This tactic is peculiar, as FBI data shows that Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire have the lowest violent crime rates in the U.S. These states have enjoyed their peaceful existence without the gun controls Rosenthal demands and while recognizing their residents’ Right-to-Carry a firearm for self-defense without a permit (Vermont did criminalize private transfers and impose magazine restrictions in 2018, but enjoyed a similarly low crime rate prior to these laws). In contrast, Massachusetts has nearly double the violent crime rate of New Hampshire and Vermont and more than triple that of Maine.

Not content to harass the Bay State and its visitors, in 2005 Rosenthal helped found the American Hunters and Shooters Association. The now defunct organization claimed that it was a group of gun owners “countering years of polarized debate and restoring pride in America’s hunting and shooting heritage.” In truth, the organization was a disguise for gun control activists seeking to undermine support for grassroots pro-gun groups like NRA and pro-gun candidates going into the 2006 and 2008 elections. When asked whether the AHSA was a front for the gun control lobby, fellow founder and paid expert for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence Bob Ricker replied, “That perception would be out there, yes.”

More: https://www.nraila.org/articles/20200914/gun-controllers-try-to-hide-joe-biden-s-anti-gun-extremism