Vice President Kamala Harris decried dangerous religion arguments towards gun reform Thursday evening at a livestream occasion hosted by Oprah Winfrey within the battleground state of Michigan. Harris spoke candidly on the “Unite for America” discussion board in gentle of the mass capturing at Apalachee Excessive College in Georgia that killed two college students and two lecturers on Sept. 6.
“I think for far too long on the issue of gun violence, some people have been pushing a really false choice,” mentioned the Democratic presidential nominee. “To suggest you’re either in favor of the Second Amendment or you want to take everyone’s guns away.”
All through her marketing campaign, Harris has pushed again on the cynical GOP stance that if lawmakers aren’t in favor of any and all weapons circulating with out laws, which means they wish to “take away all our guns.” This black-and-white framing leaves no room for commonsense gun reform on the nationwide stage. However reform is a profitable coverage stance: Analysis reveals that six in 10 People favor stricter gun legal guidelines.
Harris reiterated that she is a gun proprietor in an informal comment in the course of the occasion.
“If you break into my house, you’re getting shot,” she mentioned, then chuckled. “I probably should not have said that.”
“I’m not trying to take everyone’s guns away,” Harris added. “I believe in the Second Amendment.”
Mass shootings and gun violence are a dismal, unlucky, and anxiety-inducing actuality of American life, and depressingly near being normalized because of their frequency. The Democratic Social gathering has lengthy advocated for gun reform, whereas Republicans have fought towards any laws. Marketing campaign contributions from the gun foyer might be at play: The Nationwide Rifle Affiliation had a $2.5 million lobbying funds in 2023.
Harris needs to implement laws that might lower the variety of mass shootings and maintain weapons out of the fingers of those that shouldn’t have them.
If elected, right here’s what she proposes to implement on the federal stage:
Assault weapons have high-capacity magazines with the power to shoot a number of rounds in seconds. These are totally different from hand weapons, which fireplace single rounds without delay, limiting the scope of harm or demise. An assault weapons ban would make it unlawful to personal a high-capacity journal, and in flip, make mass shootings much less deadly.
These are legal guidelines that require all gun consumers to endure a background examine, no matter how or the place they’re buying the firearm. This would come with personal gross sales, gun reveals, and on-line transactions. A key aim of common background checks is closing gun present loopholes, which permit purchases to be made on the spot and with out a background examine.
Knowledge from Oxford College means that states with common background examine legal guidelines expertise decrease charges of gun-related homicides and suicides.
Pink flag legal guidelines, also referred to as excessive threat safety orders, are authorized provisions that permit regulation enforcement businesses or relations to make use of the court docket system to briefly take away weapons from those that are deemed a hazard to themselves or others. In line with Everytown for Gun Security, 21 states together with California, Washington, and Maryland have already carried out crimson flag legal guidelines, and Maine activists will quickly begin amassing signatures to place a provision on the 2025 or 2026 poll. What Harris proposes would make it federal regulation.
Right here’s the precise textual content of the Second Modification within the Structure: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
None of those gun reforms will take away somebody’s proper to personal a firearm for his or her safety. These proposed modifications purpose to lower the nationwide nightmare that’s mass shootings and maintain weapons out of the fingers of criminals and people vulnerable to utilizing them for murder or suicide.
That doesn’t infringe on the Second Modification.
