By: José Niño
During a NewsNation town hall, Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vowed to sign an “assault weapons” ban bill into law if it got to his desk.
When RFK Jr. received a question about the potential passage of an “assault weapons” ban, he replied, “If we can get a consensus on it, if Republicans and Democrats agreed and it passed Congress, I would sign it.”
He made his proclamation about an “assault weapons” prohibition a few minutes after suggesting that guns are not the problem. He even went as far as to observe that Americans have always possessed firearms. He also noted that Americans used to take firearms to school for “gun clubs,” and there were no incidents of mass shootings.
Curiously, RFK Jr.’s indication of his support for an “assault weapons” ban came not too long after he declared at a New Hampshire town hall that he would not confiscate firearms.
At the New Hampshire town hall, RFK Jr. stated, “Anyone who tells you that we can end the violence to our children that’s going on now by removing people’s guns, in the margin that has been left to us by this very expansive Supreme Court decision [Bruen] is not being truthful with you.”
RFK Jr. made similar anti-firearms confiscation remarks in a discussion with billionaire magnate Elon Musk. He commented, “My position on gun control is that I’m not going to take away anybody’s guns. I’m a constitutional maximalist and the issue has been settled by the Supreme Court.”
Dudley Brown, the president of the National Association for Gun Rights, commented on RFK Jr.’s remarks:
“RFK Jr. is talking out of both sides of his mouth. You can’t say ‘I’m not going to take away anybody’s guns’ to Elon Musk and then turn around a couple of weeks later and say you would sign an assault weapons ban, it’s a bunch of hogwash.”
At the end of the day, RFK Jr. is a candidate for the Democratic Party, a thoroughly anti-gun political entity. In previous decades, the party could at least count on several rural and working-class constituents to give it somewhat of a pro-gun base.
However, the Democratic Party’s recent turn towards elitism and the catering to the political desires of the professional managerial class and anti-American ethnic grievance groups has made it become completely hostile to the right to bear arms. RFK Jr. has to politically comport with that reality.
Real political change will ultimately come from below, as relentless gun rights activists make the gun issue front and center of American politics. This will ensure that all political actors across the political spectrum feel the wrath of angry gun owners when they legislate against their interests.
When it comes to gun politics, all politicians must learn that angering gun owners will come with a massive political cost. It’s the only language they understand.
José Niño is a freelance writer based in Austin, Texas. Contact him via Facebook, Twitter, or email him at [email protected]. Get his e-book, The 10 Myths of Gun Control, here.