How to we get gun owners to vote? Give them a reason! Depending on where you live, that reason may seem obvious. But, where I live, that reason is rarely obvious for anything besides the presidential race.
Let’s face it, the national Republican Party is nominally pro gun, at best. Many state Republican Parties are worse than that. Yet some state parties are pretty good on the Second Amendment.
My state GOP sucks, quite frankly on the Second Amendment. My state GOP sucks on every issue, but I’ll limit this to the Second Amendment.
First, ask yourself, for a gun owner, what’s the difference between an anti gun Republican and a Democrat? Nothing. Now you may be thinking other issues, but do the other issues truly matter if the militia is not allowed to bear arms? I don’t think the other issues matter at all, if we can’t first bear arms. And lets not forget, what “arms” means… It means ” Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American.” wrote Tench Coxe. So we’re not just talking concealed carry pistols and AR15’s… “Arms” means every weapon of the soldier.
If some one wants power over you, and they’re either outright hostile to civilians bearing arms, or wishy washy, then they shouldn’t have power, period. Why? Again, the militia. Who’s the militia? It’s not the national guard. It’s the civilian, the unorganized military aged male, bearing arms. What’s the purpose of the militia? There’s two purposes. One, is by its very existence, to be a check on tyrannical power by the simple fact of millions, maybe even well over 100million armed Americans… Let’s say intimidating potential tyrants from crossing the line.
From a tyrants point of view, tens of millions, or 100million plus armed Americans, is scary. And it should be scary. Again, intimidation.
The second purpose of the militia, is if necessary to fight tyranny, foreign and domestic. And thank God it hasn’t come to that. But will it? You better pray it doesn’t. Because that will be fight where there is no winner, just a survivor.
Which leads us down another rabbit hole of why the emphasis on “self defense” by 2A groups and Republicans? The Second Amendment isn’t about “self defense”. The Second Amendment is about national defense. Read the Second Amendment, does it mention “self defense”? No it does not. It’s about defending we the people from tyrants. 9mm’s and .38spl’s don’t win wars. Wars are won with rifles, “And every other terrible implement of the soldier”.
Now, back to giving gun owners a reason to vote. Who’s talking about the militia? I don’t hear it mentioned by 2A groups often, and never by Republicans. That needs to change.
When I talk to gun owners, who live in my area, and who don’t vote, the most common reason they give, is some version of “Republicans never do anything”. That’s totally correct at the state level. Republicans don’t do anything. The Democrats have been slowly chipping away at our Second Amendment rights for the last fourteen years… We haven’t had a Republican governor since 2011. And, even then, the GOP didn’t do much, other than pass concealed carry permission slips bill.
In the mean time, state Republicans have cut back on some of the worst the Democrats have offered up in terms of anti gun laws. Yet, still, we don’t have constitutional carry. We still became a red flag law state, and were forced to submit to universal background checks-aka, universal gun registration.
And we still must have a permission slip to buy a hand gun or an “assault rifle”. Though concealed carry permit holders can use their carry permits in lieu of asking their police chief for a separate permit to purchase.
With adoption of all these anti Second Amendment laws, and with little to no Republican push back, and little to no campaigning being done by Republicans to restore our Second Amendment rights, is it any wonder there’s gun owners who don’t vote?
Recently the US Supreme Court decided not to hear the state’s challenge of a concealed carry permit ruling which now means, 18 to 20 year olds can apply for a concealed carry permit. But how’d that happen? 2A groups filing lawsuits, NOT the state GOP.
Now there’s another issue. In my district, in most election cycles, I don’t even have a Republican candidate for both state house and the state senate. In some cycles, there isn’t a Republican running for either. And when a Republican does run, they’re either loons, literally or so underfunded, they don’t have anything more than a one page website- sometimes no website at all, saying they’re a husband, father, business man, and they want to cut down on crime, and wasteful spending and fix the schools.
Yeah, that’s it no specifics. No nothing. And they of course lose.
The last election, Republicans didn’t bother to put up a sheriff candidate nor a county attorney (DA) candidate. We had two choices, for each office, and all Democrats. Now we got a George Gascone type of county attorney… Yes, the one who gave a “diversionary program” to the nut state employee who did $20,000 plus in damages to Tesla’s. Just because that made national news, doesn’t make it the worst she’s done, she’s done a lot worse, much worse, but it’s only made local news… She’s soft on murderers, soft on child rapists… She’s soft on the worst of society. We did have a Republican run for county board, and she probably would’ve been good too, but… Though she had a decent website, which gave an actual agenda, she did little campaigning, no mailers, no ads, no support from the state Republican Party and she got creamed by a Democrat.
People mock Minnesota for having Tampon Tim, or as I call him, the ‘wood chuck’, as “governor”. Well, the last time he was up for re-election the Republicans ran a guy who when in the state legislature WROTE anti gun bills. Three I think. And on other issues, he was about as milquetoast as you can get. He was so bad, and so missing in action, that one of the guys we hunt with, who always votes, and always votes Republican, didn’t even know the candidate’s name.
And state Republicans were “shocked”, when they ran this liberal against a woke tyrant, and the liberal lost.
When Tim Walz first ran for governor, we actually had a decent candidate from the Republicans running against him. He actually had a platform, and seemed pretty solid on the Second Amendment. Yet what happened? Apparently he believed too much in the party platform, and not the elites demands, that the Republicans sabotaged his campaign. He literally ran out of money. The entire last 4-6 weeks, no ads, no mailers, nothing. The GOP shot themselves in the foot. You won’t win an election if people don’t hear or see you.
And just about everything I said above from our local races, can be applied to our congressional, and senate races as well. Milquetoast, “I’m pro gun…” Kinda maybe sorta, depends on who’s asking and the time of day and which way the wind’s blowing- like my last Republican congressional candidate. Or they’re absolute loons… Like the GOP’s 2024 Senate Candidate, his qualification according to the GOP? He’s black, and likes Trump. No positions, no campaigning, no ads, no mailers, no interviews, and he got in trouble with the FEC for allegedly spending campaign funds on a party at a strip club in Florida… And other allegations of campaign money going to non campaign expenses… Guess how that turned out? He got, I believe just 34% of the vote. Word has it he’ll run again when next year, one of the Democrat Senators is set to retire. If he gets the nomination… Automatic Democrat win.
So how do we get gun owners to vote? My idea… Give them someone to vote for. Someone who believes in the Bill of Rights, someone who believes in the Second Amendment. Someone who understands the meaning of the Second Amendment, that it’s about the militia, and being a check against tyranny. And the GOP must support the candidate, with money and a website, ads, mailers. The candidate must campaign! Get out, talk, give interviews. Get up on the literal, and digital soap box and sound off on what they believe, ESPECIALLY on the Second Amendment. Show gun owners they know what it means, and make gun owners the promises.
Will all gun owners vote? Of course not. But if the Republican Party, both at the state and national level starts pushing candidates who DO understand what 2A’s all about, and start campaigning on it, and refuse to back down, and when taunted by the government media they still REFUSE to back away from their Second Amendment stances… They’ll get more gun owners votes.
And if they get into office, and act on those Second Amendment promises, gun owners will have a reason to vote for them again, or, maybe more gun owners will vote for them, as some skeptical ones who maybe didn’t in their first run for office will have seen they followed through on their promises and liked what they saw.
Give gun owners a reason to vote.
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