California Governor Jerry Brown Guns Down the Constitution

Governor Jerry Brown signs 6, vetoes 4 gun control bills that were passed by the California Legislature yesterday.

SACRAMENTO –-(Ammoland.com)- This morning, four-term Governor Jerry Brown conspired with other members of the State’s corrupt one-party majority to make it easier for criminals and terrorists to kill innocent people, said civil rights advocacy organization Firearms Policy Coalition.

Brown signed six and vetoed four of the eleven anti-gun, pro-terror bills that were passed by the Legislature yesterday.

The “Gunpocalypse” legislation signed by the Governor today will create new criminal liabilities affecting millions of law-abiding people, cost the state tens of millions of dollars in new fees and fines, and eviscerate fundamental, individual rights.

“These are constitutionally-illegitimate laws passed by a patently illegitimate government that had the audacity to attack and criminalize millions of its own people in Stalin-esque fashion,” said Firearms Policy Coalition President Brandon Combs.

“We expect mass non-compliance with these laws and encourage good, peaceful Californians to carefully consider the risks of voluntarily identifying their firearms, magazines, and ammunition to law enforcement officials, especially the California Department of Justice.”

The Legislature suspended nearly every procedural rule to rush these anti-gun, ISIS-enabling bills through to Brown before he left for Europe, a place that may have served as the model for his unconstitutional firearm policies.

Now that the first phase of their year-long campaign to support violent criminals and terrorists is complete, the members of the Legislature who passed the bills have left Sacramento for a month-long, taxpayer-funded vacation.

“The Legislature ignored every rule in the book to fast-track their civilian disarmament agenda and herd the people into a state-wide gun-free-zone,” said Craig DeLuz, the director of public and legislative affairs for Firearms Policy Coalition.

Continued DeLuz, “There are still a dozen anti-gun bills pending in the Legislature, and while Governor Brown’s actions today were disturbing, Firearms Policy Coalition and our members will continue to fight to defend and restore the Second Amendment in California.”

With Senate Bill 1446¾ a statewide, confiscatory ban on lawfully-possessed “large-capacity” magazines law enforcement interests once again cut shady deals to exempt their retired members from the long reach of the new gun control laws.

Earlier this year, Firearms Policy Coalition, two other civil rights groups, and a number of individuals filed a federal civil rights lawsuit–captioned Garcia v. Attorney General Kamala Harris–that challenges California’s gun law exemptions for retired law enforcement officers on Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection grounds.

“Jerry Brown and the California Legislature have openly declared war on gun owners and the Bill of Rights,” continued Combs. “By signing the bills that he did, Governor Brown showed us that he has no respect for the rule of law, reason, or law-abiding people. I submit that he and his ilk deserve the same contempt in return.”

“The government would be wise to remember that there are more California residents with guns than there are government officials to take them away. To coin a phrase, ‘come and take it’,” Combs concluded.

The Governor signed the following bills today:

• · AB 1135 (Levine): Bans common and constitutionally-protected firearms that have magazine locking devices.
• · AB 1511 (Santiago): Criminalizes loaning of firearms between personally known, law-abiding adults, including family members, sportspersons, and competitors.
• · AB 1695 (Bonta): Makes a non-violent misdemeanor a prohibiting offense.
• · SB 880 (Hall): Bans common and constitutionally-protected firearms that have magazine locking devices.
• · SB 1235 (de Leon): New restrictions on ammunition purchases; creates a DOJ database of ammunition owners.
• · SB 1446 (Hancock): Statewide confiscatory ban on all lawfully-possessed standard-capacity ammunition feeding devices that hold more than 10 round; exemption for retired police

The Governor vetoed the following bills today:

• · AB 1673 (Gipson): Would have redefined “firearms” to include objects that are not firearms
• · AB 1674 (Santiago): Would have banned buying more than one firearm of any type within a 30-day period
• · AB 2607 (Ting): Would have dramatically expanded the reach of secret “Gun Violence Restraining Orders”
• · SB 894 (Jackson): Would have re-victimized victims of theft by criminalizing the failure to report lost and stolen firearms

AB 857 (Cooper), which would require that serial numbers be placed on un-serialized firearms manufactured going back 50 years and on all new home-built firearms, is still pending.

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) is a grassroots, nonprofit public benefit organization. FPC’s mission is to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, especially the fundamental, individual Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. More information about FPC can be found at www.firearmspolicy.org.