Trump Selects Barr for AG, No Friend to Firearms?

[natsb88]

Trump's pick to replace Jeff Sessions as Attorney General is William Barr. Barr served as AG under George H.W. Bush from 1991 to 1993.

Here is C-Span footage of his confirmation hearings in 1991. At 1:42:23 Barr addresses some gun control issues. He voices his support for the Brady waiting period for firearm purchases and the DeConcini amendment (restrictions on semi-automatic "assault weapons") and also states his support for a "clip" capacity limit.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?22668-1/b ... ring-day-1

There doesn't seem to be much from him on firearms on the record since the early 90s, but Google his name and "firearms" and you'll find a lot of second amendment organizations concerned about his nomination and crediting him with having a hand in gun control proposals and actions in the years since. Is the concern warranted? I don't know, but I'm skeptical that he will be much help in upholding the Second Amendment.

New York Democrat Trump, who spent decades calling for "assault weapons" bans before magically becoming a "conservative" and, despite receiving the NRA's endorsement for president in 2016, turned around and used executive overreach to ban bump stocks, coupled with Barr as AG and a Democrat controlled House...

Trump-supporting gun owners be like:

[aloneibreak]

it’s getting more concerning isn’t it ?

[spacecase0]

trump is clearly not ideal
but can you imagine what hillery would have done so far ?

real change starts with local governments.
and past that, we can start to infect federal governments with good ideas.

[Thogey]

New York Democrat Trump, who spent decades calling for "assault weapons" bans before magically becoming a "conservative" and, despite receiving the NRA's endorsement for president in 2016, turned around and used executive overreach to ban bump stocks, coupled with Barr as AG and a Democrat controlled House...

Trump-supporting gun owners be like:

So is Trump a gun grabbing liberal, or is he just not paying attention?

[Mercuryman]

New York Democrat Trump, who spent decades calling for "assault weapons" bans before magically becoming a "conservative" and, despite receiving the NRA's endorsement for president in 2016, turned around and used executive overreach to ban bump stocks, coupled with Barr as AG and a Democrat controlled House...

Trump-supporting gun owners be like:

So is Trump a gun grabbing liberal, or is he just not paying attention?

Yes he is. He's a wolf in sheep's clothing keeping up the status quo.

[natsb88]

So is Trump a gun grabbing liberal, or is he just not paying attention?

He spent most of his life on the side of gun banners, then changed his tune 180 degrees shortly before running for president as a Republican. I don't doubt that his personal beliefs are still in line with the gun banners. The question is how much is he willing to restrain those views in order to maintain conservative support. If he wants to win reelection, he won't entertain an "assault weapons" ban, or other major gun control initiatives, at least until after 2020.

In addition to the bump stock ban, don't forget Donald's "take guns now, due process later" position, and Barr's similar support for "red flag" laws, under which a law enforcement officer, healthcare provider, family member, or really anybody a judge deems competent, can petition a judge to order that somebody's guns be taken away until they are proven safe to own them.

A Maryland man was killed in November when police showed up at 5 AM to take his guns. He answered the door with a gun in hand (which I would do too if somebody was beating on my door at 5 AM). Reports say he initially put the gun down, but picked it back up when the police said they were there to confiscate his guns. An officer grabbed the gun to take it away from the man, the gun discharged without hitting anybody, and another officer reacted to the shot by shooting and killing the gun owner. Police and policy makers twisted the incident to brag about the success and necessity of the new law by speculating how bad things could have been if they hadn't shown up at 5 AM one day to take this man's guns. Good thing they showed up at 5 AM and killed the guy before he could have maybe actually potentially someday committed a crime?

More than 100 such confiscations were conducted in Maryland in the first month after the law took effect in October. Maryland is not a big state. That is a lot of literal gun grabbing, and the type of law Barr wants on a federal level.

trump is clearly not ideal
but can you imagine what hillery would have done so far ?

Yes. She may very well have proposed gun control measures, which would have gone nowhere in a Republican controlled House and Senate. Republicans likely would have maintained control of both houses at the midterms, as the party not in control of the executive typically gains seats. And if Hillary ordered the Department of Justice to reinterpret old laws to ban bump stocks, Republicans in the House and Senate would have cried foul and thrown a fit instead of sitting idly by.

For all of the fear instilled, how many broad gun control measures were actually passed with Obama as president? Gun control supporters pretending to be conservatives and acting from within the Republican party are more dangerous than openly anti-gun Democrats. Now Democrats control the House and Senate Republicans will be pressured by the party to go along with anything Trump proposes, lest the party look fractured and weak.

I said it back when Trump started pulling ahead in the Republican primaries and I stand by it: Trump as a Republican is pragmatically a bigger threat to gun rights than Hillary as a Democrat. A Republican proposing gun control measures can get them passed.

[Treetop]

The danger with hillary and guns was mostly because of who shed have put on the supreme court. Your gun rights would be severely limited the moment a gun related case had made it to the supreme court. As it stands at the moment Trumps actions on bump stocks dont appear likely to stand to the supreme court. Hes also pushed back on at least one obama era provision relating to mental health. From what Ive read Trump shifted on guns after he was attacked and later become one of the few concealed carriers in NYC.

I am a bit baffled here though in that I could have sworn Nate insisted Romney was more conservative then Trump back during the election cycle and his record is much worse then Trumps with guns. Maybe Im thinking of someone else. You did vote for johnson/weld though right? Welds record on guns is absolutely worse then Trumps. Johnson likely only ran to pay off his debt from 2012.

[Treetop]

Trump as a Republican is pragmatically a bigger threat to gun rights than Hillary as a Democrat.

I love ya nate but with all due respect you simply dont understand our system or politics in this country if you believe this. As I said elsehwere back during the election and is obviously still true.... whichever party controls the supreme court will have the final say on almost all aspects of this issue. Trump put some of the most conservative justices weve had in decades on the courts. Unless some people die "before their time" our gun rights will be secure for the next generation or so. We even see push back on calis mag size laws.

If hillary had won wed be sitting here waiting until the wrong court cases came up and wiped out past precedents on these laws over night. Would johnson had done better? I am not convinced hed have put more conservative justices on there and weld absolutely wouldnt have.

[natsb88]

As it stands at the moment Trumps actions on bump stocks dont appear likely to stand to the supreme court.

This is the second time you've mentioned this, but SCOTUS turned down both cases this week and refused to issue a stay on enforcement pending the outcome of suits in lower courts. So it's already in effect and as of Tuesday you can go to jail for 10 years / be fined $250,000 for owning a piece of plastic that the ATF explicitly ruled was legal for a decade before Trump told his justice department to ban them.

It's not even so much about bump stocks. The bigger issue is the methodology used to ban them and the fact that there is no grandfathering. This sets a dangerous precedent that future administrations can use to ban more firearms/accessories. You don't see the problem here?

I am a bit baffled here though in that I could have sworn Nate insisted Romney was more conservative then Trump back during the election cycle and his record is much worse then Trumps with guns. Maybe Im thinking of someone else.

I don't recall that conversation but Romney was definitely more Republican than Trump. "Conservative" has lost a lot of meaning since most Republicans aren't actually small government / fiscally conservative anymore. Just a different shade of big government / big spending.

You did vote for johnson/weld though right? Welds record on guns is absolutely worse then Trumps. Johnson likely only ran to pay off his debt from 2012.

Weld was definitely a bad choice for running mate and Johnson smoked too much weed between 2012 and 2016 I still supported that duo over Hillary or Trump, hands down. I don't vote for people I don't actually want to win.

Trump as a Republican is pragmatically a bigger threat to gun rights than Hillary as a Democrat.

I love ya nate but with all due respect you simply dont understand our system or politics in this country if you believe this. As I said elsehwere back during the election and is obviously still true.... whichever party controls the supreme court will have the final say on almost all aspects of this issue. Trump put some of the most conservative justices weve had in decades on the courts. Unless some people die "before their time" our gun rights will be secure for the next generation or so. We even see push back on calis mag size laws.

If hillary had won wed be sitting here waiting until the wrong court cases came up and wiped out past precedents on these laws over night. Would johnson had done better? I am not convinced hed have put more conservative justices on there and weld absolutely wouldnt have.

Nah, that mentality of single issue voting is part of the problem. Every administration has decreased our freedoms. Nobody has meaningfully shrunk the scope and power of the federal government. They hype up divisive issues to hook people on whichever one they care about the most, and get them to ignore the rest they disagree with. Forget that red team versus blue team noise. I don't care which team is "winning," I care what it means in terms of practical outcomes. Hillary picking SCOTUS justices is alarming. A "Republican" president that supports gun control, and gets the party to go along with it, leads to worse damage. Trump is shifting Republicans closer to Democrats on gun control than any previous "conservative." That's bad news for the second amendment.

Trump's SCOTUS picks are mediocre. Gorsuch is alright, Kavanaugh is pretty disappointing. Again, looking at these guys through a single-issue lens is a flawed approach.

[Treetop]

Pffft, never said you should vote based on a single issue. I went through romneys record here back in 2016 and you are simply wrong. Obamacare is romney care and the dude does not have a great track record with guns either. whereas while trump did the nonsense with bump stocks he gave us the most right leaning justices the last several GOP presidents did. Even the GOP demi god reagan was as bad with guns as Trump and gave us only mildly right leaning justices. Trump didnt move the right to the democrats on guns at all, lol. No one changed their minds over it. Trumps justices might be mediocre by some standard or another but not on several important issues, like guns.

[Treetop]

Johnson appears to have only run to make up for the debt he had from 2012 as best I can tell. Dude lives in the internet age and acted like he never heard of it. For basically free he could have been all over twitter and youtube and in 1000 memes because of it. Instead we barely heard of him in the election cycle because he just virtue signaled a few times, got the cash he needed to get back in the black and smoked a few spliffs. His record in NM wasnt even impressive anyway, but then I mean you somehow think romney was decent. As I pointed out romney care is literally the back bone of what became obamacare and he did this in advance of many lefty states even pushing in that direction.

[Treetop]

Im re reading both our comments, and I have to say you think you are debating someone else I think. I was saying Trump in the WH is better for gun rights without a doubt because of the supreme court picks. this was not me telling you to vote on one issue.

Although I will say, I do find it odd at this point you still have this level of animosity towards him. Many believe hillary was the only dem he could beat in in 2016 this was true. He got 12% of bernies supporters to vote for him over trade according to some polls, and the lower end of those polls was still significant. He won the rust belt where NAFTA was never popular BARELY. If we dont fix immigration the GOP is dead in coming years and will be a regional party but Trump keeps positioning himself in ways that they are ripping themselves in half while he atleast tries to tackle immigration. Even if you dislike his supreme court picks their records on the bill of rights including the 2nd seem solid. Which is the area the left is hitting hardest atm. The 1st, 2nd and others are all up for grabs once the left takes hold... if it does. If you cant see it yourself I probably cant explain it to you, but Trump keeps the left eating themselves and its hilarious. Heck dude Im not even a righty, I have a handful of lefty views, two handfuls of righty views and like 5 handfuls of libertarians views but this is great mainly because of how the modern left has shaped out to be. We needed a TROLL as president. He got the left to show their true colors of authoritarianism and other traits. We have a chance now as I see it to retain shyt.

I literally have most of the same complaints of Trump you do. The reason it barely registers to me is because I see the actual times we live in. I see the shape of our society. We needed a TROLL. We needed someone who believes in america. who rallies his base to believe in the american dream again. trump does that even if you cant give him credit for it.

I totally agree he should have never did this bump stock crap and I agree he shouldnt have the power to. I never once said otherwise even though I admitted I barely care if they never existed because there is no situation I can see myself needing or wanting one. I cannot speak for Trump, obviously never met the guy or Id have said it before lol, but I think he did it knowing they are kinda irrelevant even to people who think we the people might fight an oppressive gov one day. In that extreme situation only like 10 retards would have a bumpstock. Youd be better off picking your shots and few of us have full auto because of changes from what 1986? (reagans era)

A few comments you made seemed to imply you thin gun rights would have been more secure because hillary couldnt pass specific laws and I agree unless very mild (like obama who made it clear we wanted an "assault weapons" ban but couldnt do it, and floated fast and furious some claim to push agendas later except he got caught) but even if it didnt happen in hilldogs 4-8 years shed have stacked the supreme court to the left. gun rights would be hanging by a thread. You happen to live in a slightly left leaning state like I do. Except mines in the west and the dems here learned long ago NOT to touch guns or you lose. That said both of us are in states the left could try shyt and with 2 hillary picks on the court, even moderate ones with a GOP senate

Ive got a solid 65% support of trump personally. There has been no president since I could vote that got above I guess like 3. I like a single thing from bush, his plan to make it so we had personal SS accounts, its probably the only way Ill see a dollar from it. I liked one single thing from ACA, I dont think its fair for insurance to deny people who pay them for coverage even if it costs more for coverage.