Vacations are wonderful, but for a blogger, they do have a downside. When I heard about the executive order by Governor Michelle Cordova[1]While the Governor of New Mexico does not respect her husband enough to have taken his last name, as per The First Street Journal’s Stylebook, we do not show such disrespect to him, and always … Continue reading (D-NM) to ban the open or concealed carrying of firearms in the city of Albuquerque and its surrounding county, Bernalillo, including by residents who have gone through the process and obtained concealed carry permits, I really, really, really wanted to write about it, but, alas!, I didn’t have my computer with me.[2]I use a desktop, not a laptop, because I hate laptops, I despise laptops, I abominate laptops.
Mrs Cordova said, from the very beginning, that she expected legal challenges, but she waxed wroth when Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen, stated that his department would not enforce her order, because it was unconstitutional.
New Mexico governor’s gun ban draws bipartisan backlash
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s suspension of concealed and open carry gun rights in the Albuquerque area ignited opposition from Democrats and Republicans alike.
By Zoë Richards | Monday, September 11, 2023 | 7:28 PM EDT
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham is facing harsh criticism from both sides of the aisle over her recently issued order suspending certain gun rights in Albuquerque and its surrounding county.
Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, on Friday announced a 30-day ban on the right to carry open or concealed firearms in public in an effort to curb gun violence and illegal drug use in Albuquerque and Bernalillo County. State police were tasked with enforcing the order, which carried fines for violations.
The announcement prompted a string of lawsuits and ignited opposition from Democrats and Republicans alike.
Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen, a Democrat, said Monday he would not enforce the ban, which he called “unconstitutional.”
This order will not do anything to curb gun violence other than punish law-abiding citizens from their constitutional right to self-defense,” Allen said at a news conference.
It’s unconstitutional. So there’s no way we could enforce that order,” he added.
It wasn’t just the Sheriff who saw the Governor’s order as unconstitutional; as reported by William Teach, both here and on his website, Federal District Court Judge David Urias issued a temporary restraining order:
blocking key parts of Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s executive order suspending open and concealed carry across Albuquerque and the surrounding Bernalillo County for at least 30 days.
U.S. District Court Judge David Urias issued the order on Wednesday, blocking the portion of the order that prohibits lawful gun owners from carrying their guns in public for 30 days, ruling that it’s not enforceable.
“The violation of a constitutional right, even for minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury,” Urias said during the hearing.
State Attorney General Raul Torrez, also a Democrat, informed Governor Cordova that his office and he would not defend her order in court, saying that it was both unconstitutional, and wouldn’t have any meaningful impact on public safety. Plainly put, the Attorney General said what everyone ought to understand: the people shooting up Albuquerque aren’t the ones who go through the legal process to obtain concealed carry permits in the first place. Criminals are criminals precisely because they don’t obey the laws!
Naturally, the Governor was highly, highly upset that Sheriff Allen dared to defy her Führerbefehle:
“I don’t need a lecture on constitutionality from Sheriff Allen: what I need is action,” Lujan Grisham said in a statement in response to a request for comment.
Translation: the Governor doesn’t care if her diktat is actually constitutional, she expects the Sheriff to carry out her orders!
“We’ve passed common-sense gun legislation, including red flag laws, domestic violence protections, a ban on straw purchases, and safe storage laws; dedicated hundreds of millions of dollars to a fund specifically to help law enforcement hire and retain officers; increased penalties for violent offenders and provided massive support to intervention programs,” she added. “We’ve given you the tools, Sheriff Allen — now stop being squeamish about using them. I will not back down from doing what’s right and I will always put the safety of the people of New Mexico first.”
Translation: the Governor believes that what she claims will increase the safety of the people of the Land of Enchantment trumps their constitutional rights!
Is Mrs Cordova saying that Sheriff Allen is not enforcing the “red flag laws, domestic violence protections, a ban on straw purchases, and safe storage laws,” as violations come to his attention? Have there been ‘red flag’ warnings in which law enforcement did not investigate and take action is warranted under that law? Have ‘domestic violence’ violations not led to arrests or prosecutions?
If there’s one thing the Democrats really hate, it’s the Constitution of the United States, and the enumeration of our rights. Benjamin Franklin, a man who dared to sign his name to our Declaration of Independence, said, “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately,” had something to say about people giving up their rights for a little bit of temporary safety, but, in reality, what Governor Cordova and many other Democratic politicians want to do, to Do Something about crime, will do virtually nothing about crime. Governor Cordova stated that New Mexico had “passed common-sense gun legislation, including red flag laws, domestic violence protections, a ban on straw purchases, and safe storage laws”, yet she also claimed that those things had simply not done enough. I have previously noted how a Lexington man didn’t care about an “emergency protection order/domestic violence order, and possession of a handgun by a previously convicted felon,” obtained one anyway, and wound up shooting and killing his estranged wife. The gang bangers in foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia, about whom I’ve expended a significant amount of bandwidth, haven’t been stopped from getting guns and shooting people by laws banning minors and previously convicted felons from having firearms, or people without permits from carrying them on the city’s mean streets.
Safe storage laws? When people buy firearms because they fear for their own safety, the last thing that they want is to have to unlock their firearms when bad guys are breaking into their homes!
But the Democrats don’t care about any of that! They want to be seen as Doing Something, even if it is unreasonable. When even the left-wing e-zine Slate says that she’s doing it wholly wrong, you know it’s bad:
Last week, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared a public health emergency over gun violence in her state and imposed a 30-day ban on public carry in Albuquerque. Lujan Grisham’s diagnosis of the problem is surely correct; her proposed solution, however, is astoundingly misguided. The governor has leveraged an emergency health law to suspend a right protected by state statute, the state constitution, and Supreme Court precedent. Whether that right should exist is beside the point; it does exist in New Mexico today, pursuant not only to court decisions but also democratically enacted laws. By suspending it unilaterally, Lujan Grisham has claimed an alarming new power to revoke well-established individual rights by executive order. And she has done so in the most blundering way possible, ensuring a backlash that will only empower citizens, activists, and politicians who view all firearm restrictions as an existential threat to personal liberty.
The population of Albuquerque, according to the Census Bureau’s July 1, 2022 guesstimate, is 561,008, of whom 49.8% are Hispanic, of all races, 37.4% are non-Hispanic white, 14.1% are biracial, 4.8% are American Indians, and 3.2% are black. Yet, when the Albuquerque Police Department released their 2023 homicide statistics as of July 2nd, they showed 54% of identified suspects as being Hispanic, 23% being black, 7% being Indians, and 16% as being white. If the problem is the gun laws, shouldn’t the problem affect every demographic group at least roughly equally?
The problem in Albuquerque is the culture in Albuquerque, just like it is in Philly, in St Louis, in Chicago, and everywhere else in the United States, but the Democrats can’s say that, now can they? Governor Cordova certainly seems unwilling to say that, so she goes after the people who are not the problem, the law-abiding citizens of the city. She’s rather attack people’s constitutional rights than actually identify and address the problems.
References
| ↑1 | While the Governor of New Mexico does not respect her husband enough to have taken his last name, as per The First Street Journal’s Stylebook, we do not show such disrespect to him, and always refer to married women by their proper names. |
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| ↑2 | I use a desktop, not a laptop, because I hate laptops, I despise laptops, I abominate laptops. |
