Minnesota Gun Control Hearings Friday Feb 3rd

[warrlac]

There will be gun control hearings on Friday in the Minnesota House Public Safety Finance & Policy Committee at 8:30AM in State Capitol Room 120.

The bills that will be heard will be:

HF14 https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/bill.php?b=house&f=HF14&ssn=0&y=2023&__s=jyzsnmrmnh0yxo78yebt: Universal Background Checks aka Universal Gun Registration

HF15 https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/bill.php?b=house&f=HF15&ssn=0&y=2023&__s=jyzsnmrmnh0yxo78yebt: Red Flag Gun Confiscation Orders

HF 396https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/bill.php?b=House&f=HF396&ssn=0&y=2023&__s=jyzsnmrmnh0yxo78yebt: Safe Storage requirements

HF 601https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/bill.php?b=house&f=HF601&ssn=0&y=2023&__s=jyzsnmrmnh0yxo78yebt: Mandatory lost & stolen firearm reporting

Take a look at them and then contact your Legislator.

[bstrawse]

Take action in our Action Center at https://gunowners.mn/action

[Lumpy]

I sent the usual email opposing, for what little it's worth. Who is going to be there to counter the banners? I might sign up to attend but I'm unsure what I could personally testify to.

[Rip Van Winkle]

Will there be much standing involved waiting for seating tickets? I'm considering coming, but my bum leg won't allow me to stand in line long.

[bstrawse]

I sent the usual email opposing, for what little it's worth. Who is going to be there to counter the banners? I might sign up to attend but I'm unsure what I could personally testify to.

We've arranged the opposition testimony and there will be a decent amount of brief public testimony as well.

Bryan

[bstrawse]

Will there be much standing involved waiting for seating tickets? I'm considering coming, but my bum leg won't allow me to stand in line long.

We expect hundreds tomorrow and there's limited seating in the hallways, that might be a challenge. There will be overflow rooms w/ seating, and you're welcome to hang in the room the Caucus has set aside but I can't guarantee there will be video available in there.

Thanks,
Bryan

[bstrawse]

For those of you coming, we have State Capitol 317 reserved from 8am - 10am - you can grab a free Caucus t-shirt and rally sign if you can't get into the hearing or just want to be there and don't want to stand in line.

Thanks,
Bryan

[Lumpy]

Followup: how did it go?

[westhope]

TERRIBLE! All 4 bills passed out of committee on party line votes.

Amendments added to make them WORSE than the original bills!

[jdege]

https://alphanews.org/opponents-supporters-line-up-in-ticketed-event-to-debate-four-gun-control-bills/
Opponents, supporters line up in ‘ticketed event’ to debate four gun control bills
Critics of the DFL-sponsored gun control bills include the ACLU Minnesota chapter.

The Minnesota chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is opposing three gun control bills that DFL legislators pushed through a state House public safety committee on Friday.

The bills would require new standards of safe storage of firearms (HF396), create criminal background checks for private party firearms transfers (HF14), and also establish a red-flag law allowing law enforcement and families to petition a court to prohibit individuals from possessing firearms if they are believed to pose a significant danger to themselves or others by possessing a firearm (HF15).

In its written testimony opposing the gun control measures, ACLU Minnesota said all three pieces of proposed legislation may be “well-intentioned policies that could be wielded by the state with discriminatory intent or impact” on “disempowered communities.”

“ACLU-MN has and will continue to express concerns with respect to the expansion of state power and perpetuation of discriminatory systems. The fundamental principles of civil liberties do not wax and wane depending on which political party is proposing to infringe on them,” Julie Decker, policy director for the organization, wrote.

How bad does a gun control bill need to be for the ACLU to oppose it?

[bstrawse]

TERRIBLR! All 4 bills passed out of committee on party line votes.

Amendments added to make them WORSE than the original bills!

We're posting video of our testimony, key questions, and other discussions from the hearing on Facebook and Twitter throughout the weekend.

Some bills will head to Ways and Means Committee, some others will head to Judiciary, and then we expect them to head to the floor, likely as part of a broader omnibus bill at some point.

Bryan

[Lumpy]

How bad does a gun control bill need to be for the ACLU to oppose it?

Pretty darn bad! Ordinarily the ACLU hates gun rights cases. And this:

“ACLU-MN has and will continue to express concerns with respect to the expansion of state power and perpetuation of discriminatory systems. The fundamental principles of civil liberties do not wax and wane depending on which political party is proposing to infringe on them,” Julie Decker, policy director for the organization, wrote.

-is the most astonishingly libertarian thing I've heard anyone on the political front say in far too long. Bravo!

[bstrawse]

Rob Doar worked his ass off on getting the ACLU to come out against these bills - their letter and written testimony was outstanding.

Bryan

[ijosef]

I don't have much to say at this point. There's absolutely nothing new or original here - it's the same exactly playbook, only now they have the numbers to implement the agenda.

I read the senate file (companion to the house bill) here:
https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/text.p ... _year=2023

One thing that stuck out to me:

A person who makes a false statement in order to obtain a transferee
permit knowing or having reason to know the statement is false is guilty of a gross
misdemeanor felony.

They revised the bill to upgrade a gross misdemeanor to a felony, and this is generally the group that shows contempt for law enforcement and corrections and wants to decriminalize things (I'm not against decriminalization by the way). It just seems odd that they upgraded the gross to a felony in the draft of the bill.

[daleamn]

Are there ANY Democrats against these new laws?
(Maybe I should also ask are there any Republicans FOR these new laws?)

P.S. I did see some of this on the news and I'd like to thank MN Gun Caucus for their efforts, especially for Rev. Tim Christopher to the podium.