Kamala Harris’s insistence that she’s a Second Amendment supporter (who also believes in bans on so-called assault weapons and a variety of other restrictions on lawful gun owners) has gone completely unchecked by the paltry number of reporters who’ve been granted access to the Democratic presidential candidate. There’s a simple question that Harris should be able to easily answer, but so far it hasn’t been asked:
Do you believe the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms, and if so, when did you change your mind and why?
We’ve already discussed Harris’s involvement in an amicus brief in Heller where she and other progressive District Attorneys argued there is no individual right to keep a gun in the home while defending Washington, D.C.’s ban on handguns. We’ve talked about her response to the Supreme Court’s more recent decision in Bruen striking down “may issue” carry laws, which Harris claimed defied “common sense and the Constitution.”
Now, however, Second Amendment attorneys Chuck Michel and Kostas Moros have shared evidence that Harris not only backed a D.C.-style ban on handguns in San Francisco in 2005, but supported the mandatory turn-in of all pistols lawfully owned by San Francisco residents.
Do you believe the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms, and if so, when did you change your mind and why?
We’ve already discussed Harris’s involvement in an amicus brief in Heller where she and other progressive District Attorneys argued there is no individual right to keep a gun in the home while defending Washington, D.C.’s ban on handguns. We’ve talked about her response to the Supreme Court’s more recent decision in Bruen striking down “may issue” carry laws, which Harris claimed defied “common sense and the Constitution.”
Now, however, Second Amendment attorneys Chuck Michel and Kostas Moros have shared evidence that Harris not only backed a D.C.-style ban on handguns in San Francisco in 2005, but supported the mandatory turn-in of all pistols lawfully owned by San Francisco residents.
From the San Jose Mercury News article that ran shortly before Prop H went before San Francisco voters:
The city that made Dirty Harry famous, but also witnessed the assassination of a mayor and supervisor a generation ago, on Tuesday will weigh enacting the toughest handgun ban in the nation.
If Proposition H passes on the ballot, San Francisco residents would not be allowed to own handguns and would have to turn in ones already in their possession by April 1.
The proposal comes at a time when San Francisco is confounded by how to stop the rise of gun-related homicides in recent years, particularly among youths. But opposition from gun-owner groups is fierce, and San Francisco is poised again to insert itself in the middle of a contentious national debate.
The National Rifle Association and several other groups have promised to file suit as early as Wednesday morning should the measure pass — which is expected in a city known for its liberal bent.
The NRA and others will argue that San Francisco is again overstepping its bounds by taking on a role — similar to the city’s decision to marry same-sex couples in 2004 — that should be left up to the state. Their view is that deciding who can own a gun is the state’s job, and the California Supreme Court has upheld that notion in the past.
Although Mayor Gavin Newsom has not taken a position, several of the city’s most liberal leaders are supporting the far-reaching ban — including District Attorney Kamala Harris and four supervisors who are listed as sponsors. Newsom, instead, has been touting his pilot program to place security cameras at high-crime locations, an idea he’s borrowed from Chicago.
The handgun ban referendum was approved by 53% of those who voted in 2005, but the law was blocked and eventually struck down by a local judge before it could take effect. That decision was unanimously upheld by the California Supreme Court, and five years later the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Chicago’s handgun ban as a violation of the Second Amendment.
Though Harris now claims to be a Second Amendment supporter, the evidence shows that she’s actually supported bans on handguns and semi-automatic long guns, including requiring existing owners to hand them over to the government. It’s hard to think of any law that would be more in conflict with our right to keep and bear arms than the prohibitions she’s supported in the past. While it’s possible that Harris has indeed changed her mind at some point over the past twenty years, there’s nothing in her political record or her personal statements to indicate a change of heart other than her repeated insistence that she’s now a Second Amendment supporter.
If Harris really has done a 180-degree turn from her stated position that the Second Amendment doesn’t protect an individual right to keep and bear arms, it should be no problem for her to explain what led to her change of heart. But Harris hasn’t volunteered that information, which is yet another indication that her professed support for the Second Amendment is pure malarkey (to borrow a phrase from the guy she replaced at the top of this year’s Democratic ticket).
It’s time for the media to quit puffing up and promoting Harris’s claim of gun ownership and start asking some basic questions about the actual positions she’s taken over the years. It’s also high time voters start asking themselves a simple question: if Harris’s record shows she’s been in favor of banning handguns and forcing existing owners to turn them over to the government why should they believe her when she now says she supports the Second Amendment and isn’t interested in taking anyone’s guns away?
