The Patriot Post® · Dems' Impossible Dream: Gun-Confiscation

Conservatives should thank Democrat presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke for exposing just how negative his party views Americans’ Second Amendment rights. O'Rourke finally admitted publicly what leftists talk about only in secret — namely, how to achieve their goal of a disarmed America. O'Rourke has freely moved from “nobody wants to take your guns” to “hell yes, we’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47.”

Initially, O'Rourke dubiously claimed that if his gun “buyback” law was passed, no force would be necessary to enforce the law because he trusted that Americans would simply comply with the law. That raises the obvious question: If O'Rourke was so willing to trust his fellow citizens to follow the law, then why seek to confiscate their firearms in the first place? As he was pressed on the issue of citizen compliance, O'Rourke finally acknowledged that in order to enforce his mandatory firearm “buyback,” force would be required.

Clearly, O'Rourke is using his gun “buyback” policy as a political strategy to appeal to the emotional fears of those who see firearms rather than the criminals wielding them as the problem. What is ironic is that O'Rourke, who attacked law enforcement as “Jim Crow,” is now fine with law enforcement enforcing mandatory gun confiscation.

But that’s assuming law enforcement would even do so.

The Washington Free Beacon reports that Jim Pasco, executive director of the largest police union in the country, the National Fraternal Order of Police, has different ideas. Pasco states, “Mr. O'Rourke may not be aware that state and local police officers (who compromise more than 90% of all police in the U.S.) receive their orders from their local jurisdictions — not from the Federal Government.”

Sheriff AJ Louderback of Jackson County, Texas, noted that many sheriffs across the nation simply would not comply: “I think [O'Rourke’s] seriously misjudging the law enforcement response to what he wants to do. Many sheriffs would not comply with his plan.”

There’s also the reality of how many firearms exist in the U.S. There are an estimated 16 million AR-15s in the country, which represents only 4% of the total number of firearms in the U.S. As the Washington Examiner observes, “The reality is that there are so many of these rifles that even an astronomical surrender rate would leave a massive stockpile in civilian hands. The surrender rate would probably be low, leaving tens of millions of rifles in circulation.”

Rifles of any type were involved in just 403, or 2%, of all murders in 2017. In fact, hands and feet were used to murder more people (692) than rifles. If O'Rourke’s gun confiscation were to be “enforced,” deaths from firearms would likely increase exponentially. The truth is O'Rourke’s gun confiscation is a plan for pitting the government against its own people.