Opinion
U.S.A. –-(Ammoland.com)- Washington State Governor and Presidential hopeful Jay Inslee is sending threatening letters to gun dealers across the state.
The Evergreen State recently passed some of the strongest gun control measures in the United States. This new law is known as Initiative 1639. It is so extreme that a lot of Washington State sheriffs and police chiefs are refusing to enforce it because of their oath to uphold the Constitution and their belief that this law is an affront to the Second Amendment.
The Governor and Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson have sent these sheriffs at least three threatening letters insisting they enforce the new state law. The sheriffs have not backed down on their insistence that they cannot enforce the new statutes without violating their oath.
Police Chief Loren Culp in the small Washington town of Republic took a page out of Democrat elected official’s playbook and designated the city as “Second Amendment Sanctuary City Ordinance” and said on a Facebook post, “As long as I am Chief of Police, no Republic police officer will infringe on a citizen’s right to keep and bear arms, PERIOD!”
With threatening ultimatums to the head of local law enforcement agencies not working Gov. Inslee is taking the fight directly to gun dealers. On Thursday, the Governor along with AG Ferguson sent letters to 262 dealers in these “sanctuary” cities and counties threatening legal action if they did not immediately comply with the law.
The law puts new regulations on selling what the politicians deem “Semiautomatic assault rifles.”
The made-up term refers to “any rifle which utilizes a portion of the energy of a firing cartridge to extract the fired cartridge case and chamber the next round, and which requires a separate pull of the trigger to fire each cartridge. ‘Semiautomatic assault rifle’ does not include antique firearms, any firearm that has been made permanently inoperable, or any firearm that is manually operated by bolt, pump, lever, or slide action.”
This law uses the most aggressive definition of “assault rifle” of any state in the nation. Most states define “assault rifles” or “assault weapons” as a semiautomatic rifle with one or more cosmetic feature. The actual definition of an “assault rifle” is a select fire gun that is not in the hands of most civilians.
Under the law dealers cannot sell semi-automatic rifles to anyone under the age of 21. The buyers have to have taken classes in basic firearm safety, secure gun storage, the safety of children and firearms, suicide prevention, safe handling, and state and federal firearm law. The class/classes have to have been taken within the last five years.
The buyer also must get a written letter from their local head of law enforcement stating that they are legally allowed to own a gun and the chief of police or sheriff must run a background check on the buyer using the national instant criminal background check system (NICS). The buyer must then again be run through NICS by the dealer.
The law also mandates a ten-business-day waiting period after the buyer purchases the gun. Since the state does count not holidays and weekends as business days, the waiting period could be as much as 17 days during the Christmas holiday season.
The letter also took shots at the heads of law enforcement agencies that are unwilling to bend to the will of the Governor.
“Certain officials in your county have publicly said they will not enforce Initiative 1639 because they believe it is unconstitutional,” the letter reads. “We want to prevent you and your business from finding yourself in legal jeopardy because of a misunderstanding of the law caused by statements made by elected officials in your area.”
Gov. Inslee said the sheriffs are acting as “mini-Supreme Courts” and told the dealers that they would be using Washington State Patrol to enforce the law as well as bring in the ATF. Violating the law is a felony that is punishable with up to five years in prison.
There is a lawsuit working its way through the court system. In the suit, the NRA and the Second Amendment Foundation both argue that the law violates not only the US Constitution, but it also violates the Washington State Constitution on Second Amendment grounds and puts an undue burden on gun buyers.
Governor Inslee is running for President and is currently running TV ADs. His platform consists of far-left policies such as anti-gun laws.
About John Crump
John is a NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. He is the former CEO of Veritas Firearms, LLC and is the co-host of The Patriot News Podcast which can be found at www.blogtalkradio.com/patriotnews. John has written extensively on the patriot movement including 3%’ers, Oath Keepers, and Militias. In addition to the Patriot movement, John has written about firearms, interviewed people of all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and is currently working on a book on leftist deplatforming methods and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, on Facebook at realjohncrump, or at www.crumpy.com.