2A Newsletter: July 8th

Illinois won’t wake up, even after July 4th mass shooting

Abandoned lawn chairs and strollers from the Highland Park Shooting. (Photo Source: marchello74 via Shutterstock)

Every now and then, I like to unplug from the internet. It’s healthy and it slows life down. So it was extremely disheartening that I had to learn about the most recent mass shooting from a friend in Australia when they asked for more details. This monday, a gunman on a rooftop opened fire on an Independence Day parade in an affluent Chicago suburb which killed seven people and injured 46 more. There was an hour long manhunt where over a hundred officers from multiple agencies were called to the scene before the shooter was apprehended.

Although the Illinois governor is definitely wrong about mass shootings happening every week, they are certainly trending upwards as there were six mass shootings in 2021 — the Highland Park July 4th Parade Shooting marked the 7th one for this year alone and we still have six months to go before the end of 2022.

Amidst the shock, the pain and the grief it's understandable that many people close to the situation are ignorant of how ineffective gun control laws can be. It becomes especially apparent when these terrible events happen in a state that has one of the “strongest gun control laws.” But what is the gut reaction for when people are wrongfully killed out of the blue? “Nevermind all that, more gun control!”

In the past couple of years “ghost guns” have received a lot of attention from politicians and the mainstream media. Instead of looking inward and reviewing how broken the system is - in reality, 80 percent lower receivers and unfinished pistol frames are just a scapegoat and used to gain political brownie points as anti-gunner politicians pander to their base.

A string of police reports released to the public revealed that the Highland Park shooter (omitting his name for obvious reasons), actually had multiple run-ins with the law over the past decade. Most notably and recently, was in September of 2019 when police were called to his residence due to family members being concerned for their safety after the person had said “he was going to kill everyone.” When police arrived at the home, 16 knives, a dagger and sword were confiscated though there was no arrest at the time.

Despite this event and a filed “Clear and Present Danger'' police report for it, the shooter was still able to clear the state-required background checks to legally buy his firearms used in the shooting this week.

The state of Illinois has some of the most stringent gun control laws in the country including universal background checks, firearm purchase waiting periods, red flags are more. See our blog on Illinois’ gun laws here; which begs the question why people continue to subscribe to a system that doesn’t work?

UPS Cancels 80 Percent Arms’ Account

The UPS (United Parcel Service) has canceled the commercial accounts of all gun dealers and any companies that ship even firearm parts or accessories. Companies affected by this change in policy include smaller companies like Grid Defense to retail giants like Brownells. 80 Percent Arms had also received a letter from UPS which can read above. Contrary to what their letter states, we are in complete alignment with federal and state laws and do not ship any products to any states that prohibit or restrict these items.

Thankfully for us we ONLY ship using FedEx and USPS. Still, this sets a dangerous precedence.

If you think the ATF are going to go door to door to confiscate your guns and risk a bunch of ‘Ruby Ridges’ or ‘Wacos’ to happen, think again. We previously reported that the anti-gunners would simply come after your wallet through financial institutions. Of course, we were also concerned about American gun owners getting doxxed, which recently happened to all California gun owners.

What we didn’t see coming was shipping services deciding to join in on the virtue signaling as well. It didn’t matter if companies were completely compliant with the ATF or shipping products to states that allowed the purchase and ownership of whatever gun-related products in packages — UPS didn’t care and abruptly pulled the plug on the gun industry’s ability to ship things through their service. As a result, it’s likely that hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of products have been confiscated, destroyed or stolen by UPS employees. Will there be any recourse for gun companies? We sure hope so and will provide updates in the coming weeks as this story develops.

Will California’s Handgun Roster Finally be Nixxed?

(Photo Source: Lutsenko Oleksander via Shutterstock)

After the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Bruen case, California gun owners can be more optimistic about the Renna v. Bonta case, one that hasn’t received as much attention in the media. The Renna case challenges the constitutionality of the California Handgun Roster.

If you’re not familiar with this “roster” it’s essentially a short list of older handguns that CA civilians are allowed to purchase from stores brand new. Guns like the Gen4 or Gen5 Glocks, newer HK pistols like the VP9, the Sig P320 or P365, Walther PPQ or PDP series are essentially all restricted from civilian purchase. There is now an elitist system where only law enforcement and military personnel have exemption from the roster.

These are also the same people who have created an artificial market where common pistols that may cost $450 in say Texas, may very well be resold for three to five times as much in California as CA residents can still purchase these guns via private party transfers - but are taken advantage of as they’re forced to pay the premium to have the latest offerings on the market.

In the 2019 - 2020 session, California Assembly Bill 2847 was passed which also technically went into effect recently on July 1, 2022 just last week - which created additional requirements and stipulations that continually shorten the amount of handguns that are on the “approved roster.” One of those requirements is 'microstamping'. How will that be achieved? It won’t, which anti-gunners may have possibly known which could’ve been their strategy in further reducing the CA Handgun Roster.

With the big 2A win in the Supreme Court’s Bruen case, a few things have to happen before the Renna case can move forward again as a renewed challenge such as motions to dismiss the case or preliminary injunctions… but the fact of the matter is that the Renna case now has the biggest chance to eliminate the CA Handgun Roster and could potentially normalize the pistol market for normal civilian residents in California.

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