A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep in their arms shall not be infringed.

This is the Second Amendment, and this is the Gun Guy.

Boom boom boom boom bang bang bang bang boom boom boom boom bang.

Bang bo Guy Ralford on ninety three WYBC.

Ed, good afternoon, and welcome to the Gun Guy Show here on ninety three WYBC.

We're thrilled that you are with us.

I'll tell you it right off the bat.

I want to give a huge thank you to producer Kevin who's here in the studio.

If you listen to WIBC during the week, you know Kevin Well.

He's the producer of the Kendall and Casey Show.

So here, this guy puts in a whole week of a full time job and then is willing to come in and help us out.

We're kind of between producers here, between I mean Ethan Hatcher's show Saturday Night on the Circle and my show.

We're kind of transitioning.

And in the meantime here full time producer during the week not only works full time but has to put up with Rob Kendall for all those hours during the week, and Kevin, you're willing to come in here and help us out during the gun Guy show man, thank you so much.

It's a pleasure to be here, absolutely.

And there is a lot to get into, I'll tell you what.

And I posted a couple of different topics I am going to get into tonight and a couple of things that I found fascinating.

But right off the bat, I was looking at social media and someone else posted a link to a Washington Post article, and right off the bat, I typically start rolling my eyes when it comes to the Washington Post.

If there is a liberal publication out there in terms of print slash internet, Washington Post is right up there in my mind with like MSNBC and any number of others.

And as you might guess, they've not been particularly kind to those of us who choose to exercise our Second Amendment rights over the years.

But I saw an article, and this was fascinating to me.

They were talking about a crime rate in the United States, in particular, they were talking about the homicide rate in the United States and they said, they said this quote, They said, the United States remains a violent nation, more so than many other high income countries.

But the rate of homicides has fallen dramatically for nearly four straight years.

There were five nine hundred and sixty five fewer killings in twenty twenty four than in twenty twenty one.

Figures from the FBI show, which is absolutely true.

By the way, you want to look this up, go to the Uniform Crime Report, it's called from the FBI, and they've got great data tables in there.

You can look at all this up.

But again, almost six thousand fewer killings in twenty twenty four than twenty twenty one.

And going back quote, the drop off spans both red and blue states and has unfolded even as police departments have struggled to fill vacancies.

And this is the part that caught my attention.

And Americans have purchased guns at a staggering pace.

So hold on, So almost six thousand fewer killings in a four year span, and this is during a time span this is according to the Washington Post, when Americans have purchased guns at a staggering pace.

Is that true?

By the way, last week I talked about how there were one point three million new gun purchases just last month and how that was, narratively speaking, a very high rate in a particular month, But that's been a pattern that's been going on for quite some time.

But when you look at all of this and you look at this data, it goes back farther than that.

I mean, what have you heard from liberal politicians?

What have you heard from whether it's Joe Biden or Kamala Harris or any of the Democrats in Congress for years and years and years?

Is that you What do you hear that we have an epidemic of gun violence in this country?

And we'll talk about gun violence, we're talking about homicides, and a lot of times they lump homicides and suicides together, which of course is misleading because when you look at at fatalities from firearms in a given year, they are typically two third suicides, well over half every single year.

But when you look at total fatalities including homicide, you're typically talking about gun violence to a very large degree, large percentage.

And they talk about an avalanche, a tsunami, a wave of gun violence.

It's overtaking this country and we need to pass dramatic gun control measures to stem this tide of a dramatic increase in homicides caused by quote unquote gun violence in this country.

Do the numbers really support that?

I mean, how many times you've heard that.

We've heard it so many times that a lot of people just take that as true.

You know, the highest homicide rate we've ever had in this country going back forty years, highest ever and here we're talking about homicides per one hundred thousand people.

You and the highest that ever was a lot of people would say, oh, well, it had to have been just recently last year or so.

Now it is nineteen eighty.

Nineteen eighty, the homicide rate per one hundred thousand people in the United States was ten point two, and then it went down, it went up, It kind of wavered around, and then all of a sudden, starting in about nineteen ninety four, it declined every year and got very low all the way down in nineteen ninety nine down to five point five and almost fifty percent reduction from nineteen eighty did.

It remained fairly constant, wavered around a little bit until COVID.

And during COVID, you had the Summer of Love, as we like to call it.

You had a lot of people running rampant in the streets, you had riots, and all of a sudden it popped back up.

Now, nobody blamed that on COVID.

Nobody blamed that about people rioting or looting, or burglarizing or ambushing police officers or any of the other things we actually saw during COVID.

Nobody blamed it on that.

It's well, it's it's got to be guns.

We need to restrict guns.

You know what's happened then since twenty twenty, twenty twenty, again, after a bit of a spike in homicides, homicide rate per one hundred thousand people was six point eight.

You know, it's done since then, it's gone down every single year six point five, five point seven.

And you know what it was in twenty twenty four, the last year, obviously we have complete data for four point six four point six.

That's one of the lowest rates we've seen.

This is homicide rate per one hundred thousand, one of the lowest rates we've seen since the FBI has been keeping the statistics dramatically.

The Washington Post had to acknowledge it and had to acknowledge that that's happened as people have been buying guns and record numbers.

And oh, by the way, you know what else happened between twenty twenty and now, a whole bunch of additional states past constitutional carry where people don't necessarily have to have a license or a permit in their home state to be able to carry a gun and protect themselves.

And what do we hear when we were fighting for constitutional carry over the ten years that I fought for constitutional carry in the Indiana General Assembly, what was the primary argument we heard against it?

Oh, well, if more people are carrying guns, we're going to see more people shooting each other.

We're going to see more homicides, we see more people die.

The crime rate's going to go up.

Police officers are going to be attacked more often, the homicide rate's going to go through the roof.

It's gonna be blood in the street.

It's gonna be the Wild West.

How many times do you hear that while we were fighting for constitutional carry, including in twenty twenty two when we got it passed.

It's gonna be the wild West, blood in the streets.

What's a homicide rate done?

Nationally?

And by the way, we were I believe the twenty first state in twenty twenty two to pass constitutional care.

It's now up to thirty And during those years, when those additional states we're passing constitutional care, what's a homicide rate done.

It's plummeted down to one of its lowest rates ever.

Certainly in the last forty years.

You think, perhaps perhaps just throw this out there, just spitball in here.

More law abiding citizens that have the capacity to defend themselves, to resist violent crime, to prevent violent criminals from murdering them because they have the capacity to defend themselves, their homes, and their families.

You think that's contributed to a dramatic decline and homicide rates every year.

I've got a theory.

What's your theory on that point?

And listen, you can't say there's causation in terms of passing constitutional carry or people buying more and more guns, which they clearly have.

The numbers don't lie.

It's just numbers.

The FBI puts out the numbers on homicides every year.

The FBI puts out the numbers on background checks that people go through and they're buying a new gun.

We know what the guns, We know what the numbers are on people buying guns.

But we certainly know the numbers of more and more states passing constitutional carry.

But you can't say there's causation.

But you certainly can say there's correlation.

And where there's a correlation, you can perhaps into it, you can infer that there's a direct cause as well.

And I was fascinated to see that even the Washington Post, the Washington Post at your head around that for a minute, was forced to acknowledge that this refrain, this chant that we hear over and over and over again from people like Mom's Demand Action and the Brady Campaign and the Gifford Center and the Violence Policy Center and all the gun control groups out there, what do we see when we had the annual meeting, the NRA annual meeting here in Indianapolis.

I remember the protesters from Mom's Moms Demand Action.

What did they have?

What are the signs that they all passed out?

These pre printed signs.

They all walked around downtown in Indianapolis.

With more guns, more crime, more guns, more crime.

More Americans own guns today than at any time in history, the largest percentage, the largest sheer number, and the homicide rates are plummeting.

So Mom's Demand Action put that in your pipe and smoking.

Get your head around that for a minute, because those numbers don't lie.

Right now, we're taking a break.

This is Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WIBCUS.

Guy Ralford for the law offices of Guy Relford.

You know, if you've lost your Second Amendment rights due to a conviction on your record or some other issue that's occurred with you, you're interested in your options for perhaps restoring your gun rights.

That's something we do, we do often, and we enjoy doing.

You can contact us through the website.

Just go to Relfordlaw dot com.

The phone numbers right there.

You can call us during the week or you can send us an email right through the website as well.

We do restorations expungements, which can also seal a record of a conviction off your record for a lot of convictions, not all, but certainly a lot.

You're interested in that reach out in contact us through Ralford Law dot com.

Second to nine on this Second Amendment.

This is the Gun Guy with Guy Ralford on ninety three.

And welcome back.

I'm Guy Ralford.

I'm the Gun Guy Show on ninety three WIBC.

By the way, if you'd like to join the discussion as always, you know, going back ten plus years since we've had the Gun Guy Show, we started as a call in show.

I was a kind of a fill in host on someone else's show, and we decided to have a full hour of Ask the Gun Guy or Ask the Gun Lawyer, I think we called it then.

And a bunch of people called, and a bunch of people had interesting questions, and I gave him answers, and that's what led to Wibc asking me if I went to have my own show.

And I always want to kind of be true to my roots, true to the origins of the Gun Guy Show here, and so I always want to take your calls, I think, And maybe The Home and Garden Show is the only other show like this, but otherwise I think I'm the only show that takes calls throughout the entire duration of the show.

Show.

And so you got a question, you got a comment, you want to weigh in on a Second Amendment issue, give us a call.

Three one seven two three nine ninety three ninety three three one seven ninety three ninety three.

Producer Kevin is here through his own good graces and kindness.

He's helping us out on the weekend after dealing with Rob Kemball all week I mean, that's that's that's above and beyond the call of duty, no question and uh.

And but you can call in, you can say it thanks to producer Kevin for helping us out here on the weekend, and we'll get you right on the air with whatever your question or comment might be.

But I've posted this on both Facebook and Twitter, and by the way, on Twitter or x whatever we're calling it these days, you can go on there, give me a follow while you're there.

I'm just at Guy Ralford.

But if you want to see the background on this and some of the paperwork, I reposted a post from the Gun Owners of America And one question I get all the time is, h is guy, what what gun rights groups should I support?

Who is out there doing doing the work that we ought to as gun owners and as Second Amendment proponents?

Who should we be supporting out there?

And listen, you know, I'm a benefactor life member of NRA.

Now, I became that level of member of NRA quite some time ago, and NRA obviously went through a rough patch and h and the leadership or lack thereof by Wayne Lapierre was very suspect.

Wayne Lapierre, to my understanding, is still involved in litigation over his misuse of NRA funds, and NRA cost itself a lot of credibility with a lot of people.

NRA is on the way back, There's no question about that.

We have now three I believe it is three who's your that are on the board of directors from NRA.

We have new leadership.

Wayne Lapierre is gone, and listen, I fully believe we need a strong, well funded, fully functional NRA out there as we've had for generations, in order to help fight, especially on the national level, for our gun rights here in the United States.

But there are a lot of other groups that are really doing solid work.

One of those is Gun Owners of America and I'll come back to that here in just a minute.

But Firearms Policy Coalition FPC, Firearms Policy Coalition, they are doing great work, especially in the courtroom.

They are out there, they are winning cases and they are promoting our rights.

And I've talked about many of those cases here on the show.

And the Second Amendment Foundation, Alan Gottlieb's group solid excellent.

I'm a member of all these and will continue to be in addition to my lifetime members in NRA.

Here locally, obviously, you've got the Two Way Project, that group that I founded in twenty twenty, and we were right out front and getting a lot done here in Indiana, whether it's a constitutional carry or any number of other pro two way bills we've gotten done since then.

Of course, you got the Indiana State Rifle and Pistol Association, who are a great resource, and we're right there shoulder to shoulder with us in the State House as well.

But on the national level, I got to tell you, I am a big fan of gun owners of America.

They are not shy about going to the courtroom and winning in the courtroom.

They will take on hard issues and they've had a lot of success, as Firearms Policy Coalition has, as Second Amendment Foundation has, and obviously NRA, I mean, the most important two way case we've ever had in the United States that by a one vote margin, a five to four margin in the US Supreme Court, the US Supreme Court decided that the air is in fact an individual right to bear arms protected by the Second Amendment, unrelated to service in the military, and a lot of people argued and in fact four justices of the US Supreme Court agreed.

Happily they were in the minority by one vote.

But in Heller versus DC in two thousand and eight that was absolutely pioneered, funded, advanced, championed by NRA, the Supreme Court decided for the first time that there is, in fact an individual a right protected by the Second Amendment.

If Hellard gone the other way, if one vote had gone the other way, in the United States today, if you're not in the National Guard, the Second Amendment would protect nothing for you.

Zero.

Think about that for a second.

How important was that?

That was an ORA So we got to give them credit where credit is due, the relative fiasco of Wayne Lapierre's years of leadership notwithstanding.

But anyway back to Gun Owners of America.

One of the lawsuits that they filed is to invalidate major portions of the National Firearms Act of nineteen thirty four, the NFA.

What's the NFA regulate?

Well, if you listen to the Gun Guy Show, you know this already.

But a brief review in nineteen thirty four, Congress, I think, influenced as much by gangster movies and headlines, decided that certain classifications of firearms needed to be more highly regulated than your typical rifle, pistol, or shotgun.

And they looked at specifically machine guns.

Right, you had lost of gangsters running around with the Thompson sub machine guns, and Hollywood loved to to glamorize that.

And then short barreled shotguns, short barreled rifles suppressors, which then they called silencers.

And this another thing, you know, if you listen to the Gun Guy show.

Silencer was actually the brand name for the guy who invented the firearm suppressor, Hiram Percy Maxim, who he called his product a firearm muffler, and his brand name was a silencer.

And Congress got the idea that there were going to be all these ninja assassins running around silently executing people, and said, oh my god, we need to regulate these things.

So short bailed shotguns.

And the idea is that you know, a gangster, a criminal, a bad guy could hide a short brailed rifle, short bailed shotgun under his overcoat and stink that wherever he wanted to and then inflict mayhem on society.

And then a couple of other classifications destructive devices and any other weapons.

And I won't take the time right now to go into the description of those other areas, but those other definitions, but those mainly machine gun suppresors, short brailed rifle, short bailed pistols, short barreled shotguns, machine gun suppressors.

He said, you know, we're not going to ban them because in nineteen thirty four Congress still feared the Second Amendment.

They still fear the Supreme Court.

So what we can't ban these things.

So what we'll do is we'll just tax them, but will require registration of them as part of the tax.

That way, if we catch someone who hasn't registered and paid the tax on that item, we can put them in prison.

And if gangsters are buying them, AHA will know that we can prohibit that we can go arrest them, particularly when they haven't paid the tax.

And it was a way of regulating these items, these NFA items, these NFA firearms, under the guise of taxation.

What they really wanted was the registration component.

And so what happened, well, you had a lawsuit filed.

It wasn't a lawsuit so much as it was a criminal prosecution of a guy named Sonzinski.

And this ended up going all the way up to the US Supreme Court.

And by the way, this is an originated right next door in Illinois, went to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which Indiana's in that same seven circuit.

But he was a guy who was a gun dealer who didn't pay his extra tax because, by the way, you have to pay also what's called a special occupational tax in order to deal in NFA items.

That's part of the NFA, and you can't possess an NFA item without having paid the tax.

And reach well Sonzinski was a gun dealer and he hadn't paid his special occupational tax to be an NFA dealer.

He also possessed at least one short barreled shock done without having paid the tax himself.

So he got it prosecuted, and you're looking at ten years in federal prison.

And Sanzinsky said, back in the thirties, not long after the NFA was passed, let's whole thing's unconstitutional.

It is disguised as a tax, but it is really gun control registration and regulation, which the federal government has no constitutional authority to do.

It's a police power which is reserved to the state and the federal government has no constitutional authority to even pass the NFA, much less enforce it and put me in prison.

And this goes up to the United States Supreme Court, and they issued their decision in nineteen thirty seven.

Now, why are we talking about a nineteen thirty seven decision.

We're gonna take a break here right now.

But the reason we're talking about it is because that decision forms the basis for litigation going on right now that may ultimately go to the Supreme Court as well on whether recent changes to the NFA and the taxation required as part of NFA actually render it completely unconstitutional and therefore unenforceable.

I went a little quickly through that.

If that didn't make sense to you, if that's confusing to you, I will parse that out and make it much more clear when we come back.

Right now, we're past the bottom of the hour.

It's time to take a break, it says Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WIBC.

The show about gun rights, gun safety, and responsible gun ownership.

This is the Gun Guy with Guy Ralford on three WYPC.

And welcome back.

I'm Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WIBC here with producer Kevin, who's been kind enough to help us out here on the weekend.

Stepped into the breach as we're sort of between producers and so he's doing heroic work, which we greatly appreciate him giving up his Saturday evening to help us out here, not only on the Gun Guy Show, but on Saturday night on The Circle coming up right here at seven o'clock.

But I was talking about this son Zensky case.

Son Zensky's a guy who's a dealer, but he didn't register, didn't pay his sot as special occupational tax, which you have to do in order to deal in NFA items, and he himself possessed a short brailed shotgun that's required to be registered and also requires a two hundred dollars tax for you upon registration to be able to possess that.

And by the way, whenever I talk about NFA and I talk about the two hundred dollar tax, I always repeat this story.

So if you're rolling your eyes at me and you're saying to yourself you've heard this before, I forgive me, But to me, it's so interesting.

I always want to repeat it for anybody who hasn't heard it, the original two hundred dollars tax, which has never gone up since nineteen thirty four.

What I mean not that I'm happy about paying two hundred dollars.

And listen, I have a lot of suppressors.

I'm somewhat addicted to suppressors.

You start shooting suppressed, you want more suppressors.

That's just the way it works.

I've got several SBRs and an SBS.

In fact, it was what twenty thirteen, I think, when Indiana decriminalized so called sawed off shotguns, and July first, when the Indiana law was going into effect, like at midnight twelve oh one, I filed my electronic Form one to make a short barreled shotgun because I wanted to be the first kid on my block in Indiana to have a short bailed shotgun.

But the tax is two hundred dollars, and I'm not that crazy about paying two hundred dollars for every suppresser I want to buy.

You're buying an eight hundred dollars, one thousand dollars presser.

Well, how they got pay an out of twenty percent for the damn tax.

Not happy about it, but it's an interesting question or an interesting point to say, what what else, whether it's taxes or retail costs or anything else, what else hasn't gone up since nineteen thirty four.

I mean, seriously, ninety years plus.

That's pretty impressive.

The two dollars tax has always been the two hundred dollars tax.

And you know where that came from.

The retail cost in nineteen thirty four of a Thompson submachine gun was two hundred dollars, and so Congress thought it would be really slick to impose a one hundred percent tax on a Thompson submachine gun in order for anybody to own one.

And they thought that would greatly discourage anybody from buying one, because you just doubled the cost.

And secondly, they could collect that revenue.

So at any rate, mister Sonzisky's being press secuted right over in Illinois because he didn't pay his tax and he possessed an unregistered Trump real Chuck, And he says the NFA is unconstitutional because Congress didn't have the constitutional authority to regulate guns.

There's nothing within the Constitution that gives Congress that power.

They're essentially trying to keep people safe quote unquote at least that's the ostensible reason for passing the law, and that's a police power which is not granted to the federal government in the Constitution.

And that old pesky tenth Amendment says that if any power is not expressly granted to the federal government in the Constitution, it's reserved for the states and the people.

So boom, no constitutional authority.

And the argument against that that came back from the government was, oh, no, this is simply a tax statute.

It's primarily revenue generating.

It's not exercising a true police power.

Wink wink, It's just requiring taxation.

And the whole registration thing is just sort of a way of keeping track of who's paid the tax and who has it.

So while there may be some incidental benefit of the statute in terms of keeping people safer and regulating firearms in the process, that's not really what it's about.

It's about generating revenue.

And the federal government is granted a taxing power by the Constitution so exclusively because it was a taxing statute.

The Supreme Court in nineteen thirty seven, in the Suzinski case, rules that on that basis and on that basis alone, the NFA is constitutional.

All right.

Flash forward in twenty five, we're fighting in Congress to try to deregulate under the NFA short brailed shotguns, short brailed rifles, and suppressors take them out of the NFA altogether, and different iterations of the so called great, big, beautiful bill.

Certainly big, there are a lot of people who will debate how beautiful, but different iterations of that, different drafts of that, especially going back and forth between the House and the Senate, either completely took suppressors, short brailed rifles, and short brail shotguns out of the NFA, or simply eliminated the tax on those items, but left the NFA requirement of registration.

Ultimately, the way it's passed, and this goes into effect January first, twenty twenty six, which is coming right up, they simply remove the tax.

They still require the registration on those three items, but they remove the tax.

And this was a big concession that a lot of people weren't all that happy about that.

The pro two way people in Congress were willing to give up.

But what does that do eliminating the tax on those three items?

What does that do to the constitutionality of the NFA given the Sonzinsky decision, which is the Supreme Court case.

It says it's only constitution it's only constitutional because it collects a tax.

Well, that's where we are, and that led to a Gun Owners of America lawsuit to say that the NFA is unconstitutional at a minimum as to those three items SBRs, SBSS and suppressors because they did away with the tax.

And the only ostensible reason that she's constitutional to begin with is because it collects attacks.

Well, that sounds pretty solid to me, and a lot of us expected the federal government, through Pam Bondi's Department of Justice, to simply fold their tent and go home and say, yep, got us there.

You must be right, the NFA is unconstitutional at least as to those items.

Is that what's happened?

Ah, therein lies the rub.

That's what we'll go into when we come back.

Right now, we're taking a break.

This is Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WYBC.

Guy Relford for the law office of Guy Ralford.

If you've lost your gun rights through a criminal conviction or other issue that's happened with you legally be interested in restoring your gun rights, contact us through the website.

It's Ralfordlaw dot com.

For a lot of folks, not necessarily everyone, for a lot of folks.

We can do a lot of good in terms of restoring rights.

We're happy to talk to you about that.

Go to the website, either send us an email through the website or the phone numbers right there.

You can call us during the Week'd be glad to talk to you about restoring Second Amendment rights.

If that's something that you're interested in pursuing.

It's Ralford Law dot com.

Your Rights, your responsibilities, your guns.

This is the Gun Guy with Guy Ralford on ninety three wy VC.

And welcome back.

We've got kind of a short segment here, so we're not going to be here real long.

Although I got I got to mention some idiot on the YouTube feed, see who is this jen something just made the points.

So I hate it when when people like Guy ignore shall not be infringed and and and give a pass to blatant infringement of the Second Amendment by simply saying that the tax hasn't gone up or some crap like that.

You know, usually listeners of the Gun Guy Show have much better listening comprehension than this idiot.

I'm not forgiving any infringement of the Second Amendment.

I'm not minimizing the fact the federal government continues to infringe our Second Amendment rights.

In fact, my whole point in this segment, which I will continue in a moment, is the NFA is and should be found to be constant unconstitutional and go away in its entirety.

And I'm making some interesting, in my mind, anyway, interesting historical note about how the tax hasn't gone up.

It's just interesting to me that was two hundred dollars in nineteen thirty four and it's two hundred dollars in twenty twenty five.

That doesn't forgive any infringement upon our rights.

There, Einstein, and simply noting it's interesting that Congress has never raised it.

In the meantime, what the lawsuit that was filed by the Gun Owners of America says is that because the tax has gone away, and the Sunzinski Supreme Court decision said the NFA is only constitutional because of the tax, it should now be found to be unconstitutional.

And as I mentioned, there was some hope now it turns out to be naive that the Pam Bondi Department of Justice, that under her leadership as Attorney General would turn around and say, you know, what you're right is unconstitutional, and the whole thing would fold.

Is that.

What's happened.

No, what's happened is they just, I believe yesterday the day before, filed their brief in response to this lawsuit, and they not only continue to make the argument that the NFA is constitutional, they go way beyond the basis of the Sunzinski decision and making a lot of arguments that the gun control proponents in this country have been making for years.

How offensive is that.

That's all We'll go into in a lot more detail when we come back in our number two.

Right now, we're taking a break.

Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WYBC.

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep in bear arms shall not be infringed.

This is the Second Amendment, and this is the gun Guy.

Boom boom boom boom bang bang bang bang boom boom boom, boom bang bang.

Guy Ralford on ninety three WYBC.

Yah welcome back for our number two the Gun Guy Show here on ninety three WIBC.

So we were talking about the lawsuit that Gun Owners of America brought to set aside major components of National Firearms Act.

And this thing looks to have an incredibly solid argument behind it, which is, hey, the NFA is only constitution will begin with, at least according to the Sonzinsky case from nineteen thirty seven, because it's not really gun control, it's not really exercising the police power.

It's just the federal government doing what it's authorized to do, which is Levy attacks.

Well, the tax just went away on sbr's, sbs is and suppressors.

So doesn't that do away with the constitutionality of the statute at least as to those items.

That seems to me to be a pretty simple yes, but in a move that is greatly disappointing to a lot of us, and disappointing is different than surprising, And let's talk about that for a minute.

You know, Pam Bondy as Attorney General, there was a significant portion of gun rights organizations and those of us who value the Second Amendment and in fact been engaged in the fight for Second Amendment rights for a long time that had very legitimate concerns about Pam Bondi becoming Attorney General and why is that.

Pam Bondy was Attorney General of Florida before Trump nominated her to be US Attorney General.

While Attorney General of Florida, she litigated litigation on behalf of the state of Florida to protect, to preserve, to defend the constitutionality of Florida's red flag laws allowing gun seizure from people who haven't been convicted of any crime, and one that got a lot of people somewhat by surprise in terms of the federal or excuse me, in terms of the State of Florida being willing to aid pass this and then the Attorney general there being willing to defend it in court, which was Florida passed a prohibition on the purchase of any long gun by people under twenty one.

Federal law says you have to be twenty one to buy a handgun, but federal law says you can buy a long gun, a rifle, or a shotgun when you're eighteen.

After the Parkland school shooting at the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School, in Florida, the state of Florida, the legislature passed a law there that says you have to be twenty one to buy a rifle or a shotgun, saying that essentially, if you're in the ray age range from eighteen to twenty one, you have no Second Amendment rights because you can't buy a handgun already under federal law, and now you can't buy a rifle or a shotgun under Florida law.

And a lot of people rightfully so.

And in fact, this is another issue that's going to be litigated at the federal level in terms of even the federal prohibition on handguns, and I fully expect that to be turned around.

But Pam Bondi defended that litigation as well for Florida, so she's out there on record, and again part of her job, and the reason I was willing to at least reserve judgment.

Had a lot of trepidation, had a lot of concern, But I was willing to reserve judgment as US Attorney General because her job as Florida Attorney General is to defend the statutes on the books, and it doesn't necessarily denote what her personal views are.

Her personal legal analysis necessarily if her job the job described is to defend the statute, because there it's an up or down decision.

It's legal.

It's either constitutional or it's not.

And I wasn't pleased with the position she took in those cases, but I thought, well, let's wait and see.

So then we started off pretty well with the US Attorney General and the Trump administration because one of the first things she did, she came out and announced that the US Department of Justice would review the federal government's position in any pending case involving Second Amendment rights, and in those cases where they felt that a federal statute was unconstitutional, they would fold their tent and concede.

And in those cases where they felt the argument against the federal government promoting Second Amendment rights was the better part of the argument, they would concede and they would resolve those cases and promote Second Amendment rights.

And we have some solid examples of that.

Pretty much gave up in the bumpstock no excuse me, bumpstock litigation went at the Supreme Court.

I didn't mean to say bump stock, I meant pistol brace litigation.

They pretty much gave up in the pistol brace litigation, and that issue went away.

Forced reset triggers.

They pretty much gave up on forced reset triggers.

They settled that case to say that essentially now forced reset triggers, no, do not convert a gun into a machine gun and are totally legal.

You can put a forced reset trigger into your rifle, your handgun for that matter, doesn't convert it to a machine gun.

Good thing.

I have a forced reset trigger and an SBR that I have and that's because the federal government resolved that litigation with rare Breed if you want to look that up US versus rare Breed and said, nope, you're what.

You guys made that force reset trigger.

They're good to go and and not illegal.

And so we had some reason to be optimistic.

But then we get to this litigation involving the NFA and they didn't just come back and file a brief.

And this is this is where the Gun Owners of America is trying to win on summary judgment, a purely legal argument, file a motion, file a brief court rules on that.

The federal government, in the form of the Pam Bondi Department of Justice, filed a response.

It doesn't just say, well, for certainly, it doesn't concede that doing away with a tax on those NFA items at issue makes an extatute unconstitutional.

They didn't concede it.

They argue, no, no, it's still constitutional.

They went way, way, way beyond that.

And this is where it's disappointing.

They came out and they said, well, Congress can regulate anything at once to regarding firearms under the Commerce Clause.

And listen, if you want to get me going, I'll tell you that the biggest, the biggest attack on freedom in this country, and the biggest over extension of federal power and over extension of Congress's power ever in this country has been the Supreme Court allowing Congress to use the Commerce Clause to regulate almost any damn thing they want to.

Well, if something affects interstate commerce in some way, then the constitutional delegation of power to the federal government to regulate interstate commerce is implicated, and then therefore it's constitutional.

That's not what the founders intended with the Commerce Clause.

And that's been that's been the subject of or that's been the rationale behind the passing of every federal gun control law since then, if you notice in things like the Brady Bill or whatnot, they'll say as to firearms that have moved in interstate commerce, and then they go on and regulate whatever they want to.

They weren't beyond that, and they said, well, the necessary and proper clause, right, because if the federal government has been specifically delegated a particular power, necessary and proper clause of the Constitution says, well, they also have the power those additional powers that are necessary and proper in order to enforce the power given to them by the Constitution.

Well, that's not a grant of all new powers.

It doesn't give them powers not relegated to them.

It just allows them to take the steps necessary to do the job the Constitution assigns to them.

But then they went beyond that, and they even in this brief went on to say that these particular NFA items sharp brail rifle, short brail shotguns, and suppressors.

Guess what term they used weapons of war?

Weapons of war that need to be specifically regulated by the NFA to keep American safe.

I'm going to leave it there while we go into this break, but let's talk a little bit about how completely inconsistent.

That is with the Sunzinski decision, which is the one that established for the first time that NFA was constitutional to begin with.

It's completely inconsistent.

It's maddening.

And the fact that this came out of Trump's Department of Justice and the Department of Justice run now by Attorney General Pam Bondi is not just disappointing to me, it's disgusting.

It's making every liberal gun control advocate, every gun graber.

I don't even use that term a lot.

It's overused.

What did they love to say?

They love to talk about keeping people safe, and they love to talk about guns of war, weapons of war that need to be taken out of the hands of the common citizen.

Guns of war, weapons of war.

Let's talk about that and what our founders absolutely believe about that issue.

When we come back.

Right now, we're taking a break.

This is Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WWC Guy Ralford for the Law Officers of Guy Relford.

If you're interested in having your gun rights restored after a conviction, including a conviction for a crime of domestic violence, there's a process to restore your rights.

It's available to a lot of people, not necessarily everyone, But if you're interested in knowing whether there's a relief available to you, contact us through the website.

Just go to Ralford Law dot com.

That's Welford Law dot com.

Now you've got a gun guy, Guy Ralford on ninety three WYPC.

Man, welcome back.

I'm Guy Ralford on the Gun Guy Show on ninety three WYBC.

And I got to tell you this argument from the BONDI d OJ, you know, and for Trump's DOJ to do this again disappointing and surprising her two different things.

And we knew back in twenty sixteen President Trump was going to be a mixed bag on two way.

He said all the right things showed up to the in our annual meeting, but he also said some very troubling things.

He's the guy who on live TV I was watching at the time, talking about red flag laws, he said, take the gun's first due process.

Later.

That's from President Trump, and again he says a lot of the right things, but on his watch, the BONDI DOJ is taking positions here that I found not just inconsistent with Second Amendment rights, I find completely repugnant and talking about these particular NFA regulated items SBRs, sbs is insprise weapons of war as a justification for continuing this regulation on them.

I mean, I got two I have two problems with that.

First problem is you're just appealing to this emotional reaction that oh, my gosh, private citizens shouldn't have these ultra hazard it's ultra dangerous weapons of war that could only should only be in the hands of law enforcement and the military, and and and trying to demonize firearms that a lot of us own.

And by the way, the NFA doesn't say we can't own them, just as just says we have to pay this ridiculous tax and register them.

So I mean, exactly what is the priority and keeping them out of the hands of ordinary citizens is all we got to do is bribe the government to let us own them.

Logically, that doesn't stand up.

But secondly, I'm completely disgusted by the use of that term as an argument for why guns ought to be taken out of the hands of private citizens or regulated in this case, when I have no doubt whatsoever that our founders absolutely intended for actual weapons of war to be in the hands of private citizens.

I mean, look, at the wording of the Second Amendment itself.

You know what the anti TWOA people tried to use as a rationale, And again, what for justices of the U.

S.

Supreme Court agreed with was the preamble, the opening clause of the Second Amendment talking about a well regulated militia, well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state.

The right of the people to keep in bare arms shall not be infrenhed.

We so, well, there you go talking about well regulated militia.

That means you need to be in a militia for the Second Amendment to protect any rights that you have.

Supreme Court rejected that and said, no, they were simply they were simply elucidating a motivation to preserve rights of individual citizens to bear arms, to keep and bear arms.

But when you look at that motivation, a well regulated militia, which is the Supreme Court held in the hell Or decision, is you, it's me.

It's the common citizen being necessary for the security of a free state.

If you and I, as private citizens, as the militia in the eyes of the founders, if we're necessary and our right to bear arms is necessary for the security of a free state.

There's two key words there.

Security.

Yeah, because we want the militia, I want the common man to stand right next to the standing army to repel foreign invaders, to fight wars.

That security.

But then what the word free in there?

What's the word free and there for?

And listen, don't take my word for it.

Look at the Heller decision.

The Supreme Court held this and they have reiterated it since then.

It's one of the primary motivations to pass the Second Amendment and preserve and protect the right to bear arms of the common citizen is to protect against the tyrannical government.

Why on earth would we want the citizens to be as well armed as the government in order to protect the security of a free state.

And in the same brown us say that citizens shouldn't be as well armed when it comes to so called weapons of war.

Does that make any damn sense to you?

Of course not.

Does it make any sense in the context of necessary to the security of a free state.

If we're necessary to the security of a free state, just as the standing army is, then we ought to be just as well armed as a standing army.

That just makes sense.

And it is a literal easy logical interpretation of the Second Amendment.

And then you have the Miller case from nineteen thirty nine, again talking about sought off shotguns, another NFA case, and the Supreme Court said that short barreled shotguns, sought off shotguns, quote unquote, are not protected by the Second Amendment.

Therefore, it can be regulated under the NFA because they're not particularly useful for military service.

Hold on, and they went through the exact same analysis I just did.

Under the Second Amendment, it said necessary for the security of a free state, necessary for service and a militia.

So only those firearms particularly useful for military service are protected by the Second Amendment.

And how the hell since nineteen thirty nine have we completely turned that on its head and said, wait a minute, if a firearm is only useful for military service, it's not protected by the Second Amendment.

That's exactly the opposite of A what the Second Amendment says, and b what the Miller decision from nineteen thirty nine says, and all.

That's pretty damn obvious to me, But it's obviously not obvious to the Pam Bondi Justice Department, who wants to use this emotional argument of weapons of war to argue for regulation and argue for the constitutionality of the NFA.

It's completely turning logic, law, and precedent on their heads, all of which is repugnant to me.

So is there anything we can do about it?

Well, listen, I don't know, don't I don't know that the Trump administration or the Pam BONDI DOJ will listen to us.

But in the in the social media post that I reposted, both on Twitter or x and Facebook, the Gun Runs of America they have a phone number to call.

They say, call and urge the Trump DOJ to stop defending gun registration, stop attacking the Second Amendment and in the unconstitutional NFA.

And they give a phone number.

And this is on my social media It's at Guy Relford on Twitter.

I'm also just Guy Relford on Facebook.

But the phone number, if you're taking this down, hey, it's worth a phone call.

Two O two four five six one one one one.

Pretty easy to remember.

Two O two four five six one one one Gun Runs of America owner of Gun Owners of America.

The organization is urging us to call that number.

Ay, I say, let's do it.

Let's all do it.

You listen to this show, give it a call two two four five six and say, what the hell is Pam BONDI doing.

You're supposed to be supporting and defending our Second Amendment rights.

You're making arguments that the gun grabbers use against us.

This is not what we expected, this is not what we want, and it's something we actually demand of the Trump administration to be turned around.

One hundred and eighty degrees.

That's worth a call.

I've made the call.

I'm going to call back, and I urge everyone who's listening to the show tonight to do exactly the same thing.

Is at the bottom of the arrow is take a break.

We'll we'll change subjects here a little bit, and I'll tell you what I've been ignoring the phone lines.

Apologies to anyone who has called.

We have one brave soul who's stuck around.

We'll go to the phone lines.

If you want to join the discussion about anything too Ray related, just give us a call.

Join the discussion.

Three one seven ninety three.

This is Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WYBC.

He's a Second Amendment attorney.

He's an NRA certified firearms instructor.

He's the Gun Guy Guy Ralford on ninety three WYPC.

And welcome back on Guy Rulford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WIBC.

I'll tell you what Howard has been on hold for man right at an hour.

Howard, you are a rock star.

I'm so sorry it took me so long to get to you, buddy.

I was on a little bit of a rant, and forgive me for that, but thanks so much for your patience.

Yeah, there's been a bunch of internet blogs and stuff about the VA issuing carry permits for veterans.

What do you know about that?

The vah Vedoran administration comes on, man, don't make a little online quiz.

No, man, I think that's a scam, Howard.

You know what I thought so too.

That's why I'm asking I will.

I will look into that.

But I've not seen any such thing.

And there is no There is no federal gun permit, you know that.

I'm aware of, period, and and and what we're looking at with national reciprocity is requiring each state to recognize the license of every other state.

Now, there is a little bit of precedent, and this is why this bears some investigation, Howard, and I'm glad you called because I will look into this, uh hopefully here this week.

But the there is a little bit of precedent in that Congress past, the Law Enforcement Officer Safety Act LIOSA that allows law enforcement officers and some retired qualified retired law enforcement officers to be able to carry their guns state to state, irrespective of the laws of individual states.

To the contrary.

Now, there have been officers who had a hard time with that, and there was a famous case in Illinois where Illinois basically said, we don't care what LEOSA says.

We're going to prosecute officers for carrying guns into Illinois who aren't on duty in Illinois.

But the LEOS is out there.

But that was that was a federal statute.

Is a federal statute passed by Congress.

And I don't know any authority for the Veterans Administration to pair just to have some regulation that allows veterans to carry state to state.

I could be completely wrong if anybody knows more about this than I do, because this may be news to me, and I'm always willing to be educated.

Give me a call.

Join the discussion.

Three one seven two three nine ninety three ninety three, or contact me again through the website ralfridlaw dot com if I'm wrong on this and I need to be educated, I'd love to to know more, but I think it's a scamp.

One thing I will tell you for sure is there are these things.

I see them all the time, and I always comment, and I'm sure my comments get deleted more often than not, but I always come to these things on social media says get a fifty state licensed to carry, you know, just apply here, and then they always imply there's some limited window, limited time only you can still get a license, or even specific to Indiana, get your Indiana license and you go there, you take some quiz which basically is just the questions that are on the Indiana State Police website for whether you're eligible to get a license or not, and then they say, congratulations, you know, just go here now and apply.

Then they charge you a fee.

They make it look like if you pay these fraudsters some money, that boom, they send you a license.

They can't send you an Indiana license to carry hand and only the state police can do that, and they only do that once you apply for a license on the State Police website.

And so the whole idea that these these scam organizations are out there or some of them, that they are offering classes come take your your concealed carry license class and and and get your Indiana license.

Well, first of all, no class is required for an Indiana licensed to carry handgun.

They're charging you a fee for this, and you still have to go through the same licensing process that you had to go through anyway to get your your your Indiana licensed to carry handgun.

So it's a complete out or scam.

I always comment on them, and and for that reason, I'm glad Howard even raised this VA issue, which is complete news to me if it exists, which I doubt, but I don't know for certain.

That's why I'm going to look into it.

But Howard, thanks for calling.

Let's go back to the phone lines here real quick, and let's see Mike has called.

Well, hold on, you want to talk about atomic bombs and garages?

Oh?

Yeah, why can't I have a build an atomic bomb in my garage?

I mean Second Amendment says I can have anything, right, Yeah, Well, the founders would probably say you could.

If the government has then you absolutely can.

Should there be any exceptions for that.

We can talk about that.

But in terms of basic firearms, Mike, like the kind of rifle, pistol, or shotgun I can own that should be somehow different from the military.

That's completely ludicrous.

And you know that you want to call me with an absurd example like atomic bombs, Well, okay, you're not really making a point, You're just making yourself look a little silly.

The idea that if it's a quote unquote weapons of war as a as a portable gun, then then that should be somehow be restricted from private ownership is completely ludicrous.

And by the way, the Supreme Court has already dealt with your silly example of atomic bombs in garages, which is that if it's commonly used for self defense in America, it's covered by the Second Amendment.

Now, the founders didn't put any restriction like that in the Second Amendment, but the Supreme Court has said commonly used for lawful purposes.

I don't think atomic bombs are commonly used for lawful purposes, so the Supreme Court would say that's not covered.

Or short buriled shotgun, shop burrowed rifles and suppressors commonly used for lawful purposes.

Hell yeah, Hell I pretty much qualify for that in and of myself.

Look at my gun, say for a number of sprs and suppressors commonly used for lawful purposes one hundred percent.

So silly example, and that's a great, a great example of someone who's just trying to make a silly point at the expense of logic.

I'll tell you what.

Let's leave it there and take a break.

We'll come back.

We'll go to my last topic, which is a really interesting tragic because it ended up with the death of a private citizen in Lafayette.

I want to talk a little bit about a police action shooting that angela good note from Fox fifty nine.

I'll tell you what.

If there's a local TV journalist that I respect, it's angela good note from Fox fifty nine.

She just does a great job.

She has all the credibility in in the world.

She works hard, and I think does a really nice job, and I'm a big fan of hers.

But she posted about this police action shooting and it just raised an interesting legal issue that I wanted to address here briefly on the show.

We'll do that when we come back.

This is guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WIBC.

He's a Second Amendment attorney, He's an NRA certified firearms instructor.

He's the Gun Guy Guy Ralford on ninety three WYPC.

And welcome back for the last segment here this week's The Gun Guys Show.

Interesting, tragic, but legally interesting.

A police action shooting last night or I guess the night before last in Lafayette and listen, all we have is what's being reported by the Lafayette Police Department.

But again, this was posted by Angela Goode, who, as I mentioned, I'm a big fan of But Lafayette Police Department officers a little after midnight pulled over a vehicle on suspicion of impaired driving, and after the driver was pulled over, the mail driver apparently made statements indicating a risk of harm to himself quote unquote, as reported by the officers, and then fled the scene, and LPD policy apparently didn't allow them to initiate a vehicle pursuit at that point.

They pretty much let him go without engaging in any kind of a quote unquote high speed chase, but it continued looking for him and Eventually they found him in an apartment complex part They again approached the vehicle and at this point he refused to get out of the of the vehicle and made comments that he was armed with a weapon.

And at that point, upon saying that he had a gun, quote, moved his hand to his waistband behind his back as if he was preparing to brandish a weapon.

So he said, I have a gun and then moved his hand to his waistband behind his back while sitting in the vehicle.

Now, this is all according to police, and as my friend Kirk, who practices law him off yet and has a lot of interactions with LPD, has said that he really wants to see the body worn camera coming out of this.

Let's just for the sake of discussion, say that's all true.

So he said he had a weapon, then reached behind his back, at which point officers opened fire.

In fact, I saw a video that friend of mine sent to me that didn't show much visually, but you could hear several gunshots.

I mean, they apparently shot this guy several times, which is not unusual for police action shootings.

Police are trained to stop a threat and a discussion then on social media, especially after I reposted this broke out on social media where people were talking about, well, it'll be really interesting to see whether he actually had a gun or not, and people were saying, or at least suggesting that whether he had a gun or not would determine whether or not this was a justified use of force and self defense.

Now, listen, when it comes to police action shootings, there's a whole added element that doesn't apply to us as civilians.

There are civil rights issues, in fact, civil rights criminal violations that can apply to police officers, which is someone acting under color of state law who deprived someone of their constitutional rights.

And you can deprive someone of their constitutional rights by shooting them or otherwise using excessive force on them.

But secondly, they're simply prosecution under state law for killing someone, which could be a murderer, could be a voluntary manslaughter, could be any number of different charges unless it's justified.

So let's just stay with state law and justification based on self defense.

And a lot of people on my social media post, I think this one was on x we're discussing whether or not and it's actually may be an Andrew Gannot's post.

Now that I think about it.

We're discussing whether or not this was justified.

It was going to be determined to a significant degree by whether the guy really had a gun or not.

He said he had a gun, and he reached to his waistband behind his back, at which point the officer's open fire, and I immediately made the point whether he actually had a gun or not is not even relevant to the inquiry.

And people found that really surprising, and some people found that repugnant.

Well, what do you mean if he didn't really have a gun, he was never a risk, he was never a danger to the officer.

If he was never an actual danger to the officer, then the use of force was not justified in self defense.

And it just made me realize that this is another example of where people really don't understand the law of self defense as it operates in Indiana, because, again, talking only about self defense and legal justification of the law of self defense in Indiana, whether you're talking about the general self Defense Statute that applies to you no matter where you might be, including out in public and would apply to this officer being out in public, or whether you're talking about the Castle doctrine that applies to you when you're in your home you're dwelling, as well as your curtilage or occupied motor vehicle, whichever scenario you're talking about, whether you're justified or not depends on whether you had a reasonable belief the deadly force was necessary under the circumstances that are justified in each of those different scenarios out in public.

You have to reasonably believe the deadly force is necessary to prevent serious bodily injury to you or a third person reasonably believed.

You don't have to be right.

The statute doesn't put on anyone the obligation of being omniscient, and the law and through case law and the boarding of the statute itself specifically prohibits evaluating someone's reasonable belief and the use of force based on that reasonable belief.

It particularly precludes the opportunity to use hindsight to attack someone's decision.

Well, hold on, he said he had a gun, and he reached behind himself into his waistband to grab a gun.

You then defended yourself, but he didn't actually have a gun.

Based on hindsight, there was never a risk to begin with.

Therefore, you were not justified.

No, No, and No, the law says you simply have to have a reasonable belief.

There are cases that say, specifically, I talk about this in my Essentials of Indiana Gunwall class.

You can be wrong.

The person that's a who points the airsoft gun at an officer doesn't have an orange tip, it looks exactly like a real gun, turns out to be an airsoft gun after the fact.

Does that mean the officer was not justified using force.

No, It's based on a reasonable belief.

That's how the law works, That's how it should work, and people need to understand that.

Tell you what We're coming up on the top of the hour.

That's it for this week's edition to The Gun Guy Show.

Hope you enjoyed it.

Hope you come back.

Remember always be safe and always shoot straight.

This is Guy Ralford on The Gun Guy Show on ninety three WYBC.