Trump gun ban: Today transgender Americans, tomorrow you and me
Senior officials within the Trump administration are taking steps to dismantle the Second Amendment by instituting a ban on gun ownership for transgender Americans, a ban that will ultimately end with you and me losing the right to bear arms.
The Department of Justice has held multiple meetings to discuss how they can restrict the sale of guns to transgender people in the days following the Minneapolis Catholic school shooting last month after it was revealed that the shooter was transgender. (via apnews.com):
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is drawing swift condemnation from gun rights groups and LGBTQ advocates alike after floating that it was considering restricting transgender people from owning guns — a move that would all but certainly face immediate constitutional challenges if ever implemented.
The discussions come in the wake of the shooting at a Minneapolis Catholic school last month that federal officials have said was carried out by a transgender shooter, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, cautioned that the talks were in the early stages and that no proposal has been finalized.
The Justice Department said in a statement in response to questions about the firearms talks that the agency is “actively evaluating options to prevent the pattern of violence we have seen from individuals with specific mental health challenges and substance abuse disorders.” But the department said: “No specific criminal justice proposals have been advanced at this time.” (Emphasis mine)
Left out of the explanation of how such an unconstitutional order would be implemented was this: exactly who will make this determination? Of course, that was left out because we already know the answer to that question: GOVERNMENT!
Even though Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi are using this recent tragedy as their rationale for banning gun ownership for transgender Americans, they are merely playing the same Second Amendment-killing game we have watched them play in years past.
Following the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL, Trump joined Democrats in Congress to push a bucket list of Democrat-friendly anti-gun measures also embraced by Bondi, including: raising the age to 21 to buy a rifle, expanding background checks, and banning bump stocks “with or without” Congress (ala Barack Obama’ pen and phone).
In an appearance on FOX Business with Stuart Varney, then-Florida Attorney General Bondi defended the bucket list of anti-Second Amendment legislation passed by the Florida legislature that included raising the age to purchase a firearm from 18 to 21 and establishing a “red flag” law:
“In a time of crisis, it’s about finding common ground, and that’s what Gov. Scott has done.
“Hopefully Congress will follow Florida’s lead and what Gov. Scott has been doing here in Florida and all of us working so well together.”
Of course, “common ground” is Orwellian politispeak for “let’s agree on how we will dismantle the Constitution.” Bondi also praised Trump’s response to the Parkland shootings during the interview, and she expressed her hope that he would serve as a “mediator” with federal lawmakers to get gun control legislation passed.
The “pre-crime” nature of issuing a ban on gun ownership for transgender Americans — denying Second Amendment rights based on the possibility that someone “might” commit a crime using a gun — is also firmly established within the Trump administration, both past and present.
In the past, then-US Senator (currently Trump’s Secretary of State) Marco Rubio suggested adopting much of Florida’s radical gun control agenda on the national level in a CNN interview following the Florida High School shooting, including raising the minimum age to 21 for buying a rifle, banning bump stocks, and limiting large-capacity magazines. He also expressed support for so-called gun-violence restraining orders (a.k.a. red flag laws).
By the way, under Washington’s guidance, more and more states have passed Extreme Risk Protection Order laws (aka ERPOs or red flag laws), and they have always had the blessing of Donald “take the guns first, go through due process second” Trump and so-called conservative Sens. Linsey Graham and Marco Rubio. Graham who once proposed a bill federalizing ERPO laws, and Rubio who once presented legislation to use our tax money to bribe states to pass them.
Rubio would later take his “restraining order” approach to gun ownership up a notch a short time after the Florida high school shooting with the introduction of the Threat Assessment, Prevention, and Safety Act of 2019 Act (TAPS Act) — a bill I referred to at the time as red flag laws on steroids. With Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) and Thom Tillis (R-NC) as co-sponsors, Rubio’s TAPS Act would have incentivized local law enforcement to give EVERYONE a personal threat assessment (adults and children) and then single out those they deem as future threats. That information would then be used to “stop dangerous individuals before they can commit an act of violence.”
In the present, Rubio’s failed attempt at seeing the TAPS Act become law are being revived. Thanks to Trump’s infatuation with Artificial Intelligence (AI) and close relationship with Palantir CEO Peter Theil, we are fast approaching the creation of an AI-controlled AI police force that can do everything the TAPS Act was intended to do.
A partnership between government and Palantir has been established to make this pre-crime policing scenario a reality with just a few keystrokes on a laptop (via NewsMax.com):
The New York Times reported that Palantir, the AI-focused software and military contractor, has expanded its “work across the federal government in recent months” after it had been tapped by President Donald Trump to create “detailed portraits” or a digital ID on Americans “which could easily merge data on Americans — throughout agencies,” such as from the IRS, the Department of Homeland Security, the Health and Human Services Department, the Social Security Administration and the Department of Education.
Palantir employees told The Times that the company’s engineers had been “quietly” discussing creating a digital ID for Americans and that they had grown worried about placing such sensitive data in one place. Anonymous government officials also told The Times that Palantir’s pick to create a program compiling data on Americans “was driven by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.” (Emphasis mine)
To those not drinking the orange Kool-Aid, it’s easy to see the end game that Trump and Bondi have in mind with their plan to deny gun rights to transgender Americans: the complete destruction of the Second Amendment for every American, including you and me.
David Leach is the owner of the Strident Conservative and the author of The New Axis of Evil: Exposing the Bipartisan War on Liberty. He holds people of every political stripe accountable for their failure to uphold conservative values, and he promotes those values instead of political parties.
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