When New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared a “public health emergency” for Albuquerque and unilaterally declared all carrying of firearms illegal for 30 days, I kind of figured a lot of gun control advocates would celebrate this.
After all, they too treat lawful gun owners as the problem rather than directing their ire toward those who got their guns illegally in the first place.
Yet, it seems that some of the usual suspects are doing something surprising.
They’re agreeing with us!
First, let’s look at David Hogg, who has been trying to position himself as a gun owner of late. We don’t buy it because we haven’t seen a single gun control bill he won’t support, but it seems that for the Hoggster, there is a line in the sand.
I support gun safety but there is no such thing as a state public health emergency exception to the U.S. Constitution. https://t.co/6GfbOZLc7g
— David Hogg 🟧 (@davidhogg111) September 9, 2023
Now, if this was just David here, it would be a story, but it wouldn’t be the whole of the story. After all, he’s just one guy.
Yet even anti-gun Rep. Ted Lieu echoed the sentiment.
I support gun safety laws. However, this order from the Governor of New Mexico violates the U.S. Constitution. No state in the union can suspend the federal Constitution. There is no such thing as a state public health emergency exception to the U.S. Constitution. https://t.co/kOhLMtaOl2
— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) September 9, 2023
Now, both of these seem to follow a similar form. “I believe in gun safety but…”
It sounds an awful lot like, “I’m a gun owner but…” and that’s probably because, like your garden-variety Fudd, they need to remind people of their credentials. They’re both anti-gun crusaders, yet they feel like they need to speak out on this Albuquerque thing.
That brings up some interesting points of discussion.
First is, why?
Why would they decide to stand here and now, especially as I don’t recall either taking issue with some of the blatantly anti-gun things pushed during the pandemic lockdowns, much less any other actions that were unconstitutional? They were both relatively silent, as I recall.
Some are speculating that what we’re seeing isn’t opposition to the idea, only Grisham tipping their hands by doing too much, too soon.
I can’t rule that out.
Yet it may also be a concern that if Grisham gets away with this, it could have ramifications down the line. After all, imagine if a governor had decided during the lockdowns that there could be no protests at all due to the threat of COVID spreading. How could that have impacted the Black Lives Matter protests?
This touches on a second point of discussion, namely that both Hogg and Leiu note that the Albuquerque order is unconstitutional, acknowledging that the right to actually bear arms is protected by the Second Amendment.
Sure, they’re focused on the governor being the one to suspend the Constitution after declaring a public health emergency, particularly for Albuquerque, but in doing so they both acknowledge that concealed and open carry, at a minimum, are in fact protected by the Constitution itself.
I don’t know that they meant to, but that’s what we’re seeing here, even if they are following some kind of boilerplate tweet.
I suspect this may, in time, come back to bite them in their anti-gun butts, though I’m going to enjoy that all too much as well.
In the meantime, I think Gov. Grisham needs to rethink her order as even her allies aren’t standing with her on this one.
