Liberals Plan Gun Bans If Re-Elected, Blair Tells Globe and Mail
TheGunBlog.ca — The Liberal Party of Canada will order mass gun bans against federally licensed firearm owners if re-elected to government, Minister Bill Blair told The Globe and Mail as the election campaign ramps up.
Liberal Gun-Ban Plan
- Liberals go after licensed, safe, responsible gun owners.
- Gun ban is one of first campaign promises for Election 2019.
- Liberals would order owners to surrender guns for payment.
- Liberals target owners of “some military-style assault weapons,” Globe says.
- Unknown: Details of which owners, which guns, what cost.
- Liberals may give provinces and cities more power to restrict gun owners and stores.
- No new measures to stop violent offenders or gangs.
- Source: Bill Blair interview in The Globe and Mail.
The Liberals will order owners to surrender “some military-style assault weapons,” the Globe said in the interview report published this afternoon on its website.
Blair, who rejected a handgun ban for now, didn’t specify in the article how many families he will penalize or which of their so-called “Non-restricted” or “Restricted” rifles and shotguns he will take away.
Election Bet
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is betting his career the confiscation promise will reverse his party’s sinking popularity and win the October election.
The Liberals have sought to smear federally licensed firearm owners to promote gun bans and attract votes.
Read: Liberals Demonize Gun Owners by Copying U.S. Senator Feinstein
Legal But Unethical
“What the Liberals are doing may be legal, but it’s completely unethical,” said Nicolas Johnson, the editor of TheGunBlog.ca. “They’re criminalizing honest families to try to win an election. Millions of voters across the country will do everything in our power to stop them and elect a government that respects its citizens.”
Copying New Zealand
The Liberals would be copying New Zealand in ordering licensed gun owners to turn in their firearms in exchange for payment.
New Zealand just ordered the immediate surrender of what it called “military-style semi-automatic” firearms.
The ban covers almost every semi-auto rifle and shotgun, both centrefire and rimfire. It includes pump-action shotguns like the Remington 870 that can hold more than 5 rounds of ammunition in a tube magazine, or take a detachable mag.
‘Political Stunt’
The Liberal campaign promise culminates almost a year of confiscation threats since Trudeau instructed Blair to explore mass gun bans against safe and responsible owners.
“This is a political stunt, nothing more nothing less,” Wolverine Supplies, one of Canada’s biggest independent gun stores, said May 24 as concern of a Trudeau confiscation soared.
AR-15, SKS, Tavor?
“There are some weapons that are currently available in our society that represent an unacceptable risk,” the Globe and Mail quoted Blair as saying in the interview.
Prohibitionists label the AR-15, SKS, Tavor, KelTec RDB and other firearms as “assault weapons,” regardless of operation.
Automatic firearms have been banned for decades.
Military vs. Civilian Nonsense
The semi-auto AR-15 target rifle is derived from a model designed for the U.S. army. The SKS, the most-popular centrefire, semi-auto rifle in Canada, was developed for the Soviet army. The Tavor was built for the Israeli military.
Distinguishing between military and civilian firearms doesn’t make sense. Most modern guns have functionality, parts or ammunition inspired, invented or modified by both military and civilian engineers, or for military and civilian users.
Read: Handgun, Semi-Auto Ban Could Wipe Out $2 Billion From Gun Owners
‘Prohibit and Remove’
For families whose firearms the Liberals will seize and destroy, “if we were going to prohibit them and remove them from society, we would want to consider the best way to compensate them for the forfeiture of those weapons,” Blair told the Globe.
“It is not, in any way, my intention nor my recommendation that we would do anything to restrict the activities of hunters and farmers or sports shooters who follow the rules, who are obeying the law and don’t represent a risk themselves to public safety,” Blair told the newspaper.
More Canadian Than Hockey
All guns are banned already for every civilian except the 2.2 million men and women with a firearm Possession and Acquisition Licence (PAL) authorized by the federal police.
Buying, selling, having or traveling with any gun without a licence gets you in jail.
More adults have a permit than play golf or hockey. Women are getting licences at 4 times the pace of men as sport shooting with handguns and AR-15s explodes in popularity.
Undermine and Subvert
Opinion polls show prohibition is a vote getter for the Liberals, the most-hostile political adversary for Canadian gun owners.
Attacking them is a favourite Liberal campaign tactic. The 2015 Liberal platform promised “to get handguns and assault weapons off our streets.”
A Trudeau confiscation would undermine Canada’s multi-billion-dollar system of vetting, tracking and controlling firearm owners with licensing, registrations and authorizations. It would subvert the federal police who run the program.
Read: Ed Burlew: A Gun Ban Means Government Has Lost Trust in the RCMP
False Marketing
Trudeau would also be showcasing the Liberals’ false marketing for Bill C-71 as a new law that “entrusts experts in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) to classify firearms, without political influence.”
Bill C-71 includes the prohibition and eventual confiscation of “Non-restricted” rifles from more than 10,000 families.
Crackdown on PAL Holders
Like Bill C-71, the Globe’s interview with Blair didn’t mention any new measures to stop violent offenders or gangs.
A new Liberal government may give more power to cities and provinces to restrict firearm owners and stores, the Globe report cited Blair as saying.
The Conservative Party has repeatedly said it opposes bans and will repeal Bill C-71 if elected.
Bans for Votes
Hunting and shooting are part of Canadian culture and heritage. Hunters, farmers, ranchers, sport shooters and gun collectors own an estimated 15 million rifles, shotguns and handguns.
A government adviser said last year that new restrictions and prohibitions present an “untapped opportunity” for the Liberals to win re-election.
Thousands of Canadian sport shooters just bought AR-15s and other firearms on speculation the Liberals might ban new purchases, while allowing existing owners to keep their guns.
Read: AR-15 Selling Out in Canada on Concern Trudeau to Ban New Owners