Subscribe now

Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the devices that make a semiautomatic gun’s trigger fire faster are not banned by law.

"We hold that a semiautomatic rifle equipped with a bump stock is not a ‘machinegun’ because it cannot fire more than one shot 'by a single function of the trigger.' And, even if it could, it would not do so ‘automatically,” wrote Thomas.

He explained why this is not a Second Amendment issue but rather about the federal government’s power to interpret laws and regulations.

"ATF therefore exceeded its statutory authority by issuing a Rule that classifies bump stocks as machine guns.”

Justice Samuel Alito wrote that Congress can pass a law to ban bump stocks, which seems to mean the devices may still be banned under the Bruen ruling.

Pres. Joe Biden responded to the SCOTUS ruling by calling on Congress to pass a law to ban bump stocks. This will surely be a new campaign issue for him.

You’ll remember I interviewed the plaintiff Michael Cargill when his case was first heard by the high court in February.

He explained his five-year journey to fight in the courts and to get back his own bump stocks in the story below.

Cargill, who owns Central Texas Gun Works in Austin, said on Thursday that this ruling will force the government to rescind its ban on arm braces and the requirement that gun parts have serial numbers.

He turned in two bump stocks to the ATF in 2018 when the ruling went into effect. He should be able to get them back now.

Share

My view on bump stocks is…

Read more

“I own a couple of different guns,” replied Trump. “But I don’t talk about it.” 

I wrote about part of this interview in my book “Emily Gets Her Gun” but left out how exactly I got the answer from Trump. Paid subscribers can read the full story for the first time at the end. 

Subscribe now

The .45 and .38

Despite Trump’s denial, I persisted because he had never disclosed the guns publicly. I wanted an exclusive. 

In the end, I learned about two handguns Trump registered with New York City Police: an H&K (Heckler & Koch) in .45 caliber and a Smith & Wesson .38 caliber. 

(I’m not aware of any other reporter since who has asked Trump what guns he owns, so thank you to The Daily Mail’s Nikki Schwab for crediting me as the source!)

Trump didn’t regret telling me Instead, he tweeted out my story, “Donald Trump’s guns.” 

Where Are His Guns Now? 

After Trump was indicted in the Stormy Daniels case in March 2023, he turned over two of the pistols he was licensed to carry in the city to the New York Police Department (NYPD.)

A senior police official told CNN that a third gun registered on Trump’s carry permit “was lawfully moved to Florida.”

I called the NYPD and asked if the two guns Trump turned in were the Smith & Wesson and H&K. The detective told me to “wait for a response from the email team.” I also asked what happened to the guns given to NYPD. (They could go for a lot on the resale market! ) So far, no response. 

Concealed Carry License

The NYPD source also said that Trump’s concealed carry permit was “quietly suspended” on April 1, 2023. The NYPD is going to revoke the permit any day now, according to police sources. 

Trump lost his right to keep and bear arms when he was convicted of 34 state felonies in the Stormy Daniels trial. Convicted felons can not possess guns under the Gun Control Act of 1968. 

So Trump can’t have a carry permit. That Florida gun will have to be turned over or given away.

When I interviewed Trump on Fox TV in Dec. 2014, I asked a question from a viewer on social media: 

Do you think you’re privileged in having a concealed carry permit in NY? Is it a privilege for you because you’re wealthy and powerful?

“Well, I do,” replied Trump. This was before the landmark Supreme Court Bruen decision that overturned New York’s strict limits on who could carry a gun. 

“I have the right to carry a gun. I don't consider it a privilege. I consider it probably a necessity.”

“As you know, I’m a big— as you are, Emily— Second Amendment person,” Trump continued. “So the bad guys have it. The good guys have to have it. And I’m a very staunch proponent in being able to protect yourself.”

Why Did Trump Give Up His Guns? 

It’s not clear what law mandated Trump to turn over his guns to the police when he was indicted. 

A longtime firearms attorney pointed out to me part of the Gun Control Act says it is illegal for a person under indictment for a crime punishable by more than a year in prison to send or receive guns interstate. 

That further confuses the police statement that Trump was able to legally move one gun from NYC to Florida after being indicted.

It doesn’t explain giving up the Smith and Wesson and H&K. 

Please let me know if you know of a New York state or city criminal law that made Trump turn over his guns a year ago after getting indicted.

Leave a comment

Emily Gets Her (Trump) Guns (Story)

I introduced myself to Trump as he walked with his huge entrouage into the Ritz-Carlton in Sarasota, Florida. Seconds later, he invited me up to his hotel suite…

Read more

Hunter Biden’s federal trial for gun-related charges begins on Monday. Pres. Joe Biden’s son will have to sit in court every day and face a jury of his (more similar) peers in Delaware.

Before we delve in, let’s take a poll: 

(My votes, prediction and reasoning are below for paid subscribers.)

Subscribe now

HUNTER BIDEN

While Hunter has been accused of much bigger crimes— overseas business deals to benefit his father, tax evasion— the smoking gun got him into this trial. 

As jury selection begins, it has to scare young Biden that he could face up to 25 years in prison. Unlike Trump’s trial, Hunter’s is supposed to last only two weeks. 

Hunter has made multiple court attempts to postpone the trial and get the charges dropped. You’ll remember I wrote about his appeal that the federal law against drug addicts possessing firearms was a violation of his Second Amendment rights. 

U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika denied the filing but said he could use it on appeal. The Donald Trump nominated judge is presiding over the trial. 

Hunter says he’s sober now but was a cocaine addict. Drug users cannot possess guns under federal law.

Young Biden is charged with lying on the federal background check form, possessing an illegal gun and lying to a federally licensed gun dealer.

Love Affair Gone Bad

In 2018, Hunter admitted to police and the FBI that his then-girlfriend, Hallie (his deceased brother’s widow), threw his gun in a grocery store trash can. After speaking with Hunter, Hallie returned to retrieve the gun but couldn’t find it and called the police. 

Hunter cooperated and said he bought the Colt Cobra 38SPL revolver two weeks earlier. The local investigation finally recovered the gun but no charges were filed. 

A few years later, Hunter wrote in his memoir that at the time he bought the gun, he was smoking crack cocaine “every 15 minutes, seven days a week.” 

In 2021, Politico’s Tara Palmeri got a hold of the police report and the federal background check that Hunter signed. On the 4473 form, Biden checked “no” on the box that asked:

Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?

Lying on the background form is a federal crime that is not prosecuted as much as it should be by ATF and the Justice Department. But it’s these black-and-white facts that make Hunter’s case tough to defend.

How We Got Here

Political analysts and the media largely ignored Hunter’s gun case because it paled in comparison to the allegations of corrupt overseas dealings involving his father. However, we followed the gun charges closely.

In June 2023, the DoJ announced it made a sweetheart deal with Hunter (my story on it here.) The deal said the feds would wrap up its entire five-year investigation and let him plea to just misdemeanor tax charges. 

It also said he was charged with just one count of unlawful possession of a firearm by a person prohibited and but that his record would be wiped clean after a couple of years of probation.

All the attention at the time was on the “10% for the big guy” accusations that were buried. But the powerful gun lobby NSSF Chief Counsel Larry Keane told me of Hunter’s deal:

I think a poor African American or white defendant charged with the same thing would not get this kind of a deal.

Smoking Gun Stands

Just one month later, Judge Noreika shocked everyone by saying the plea deal could not go through. (My story here.) She said mixing immunity on a gun charge with a guilty plea on tax charges was not constitutional.

The judge also asked how Hunter’s immunity on the gun charge would apply to possible future charges in the ongoing investigation

Over the next few weeks, the prosecution and defense fought over whether the sweetheart deal was still on the table (story here.) Hunter’s team said the deal was valid and that Special Counsel David Weiss was trying to “renege” on a binding agreement. 

The DoJ stuck to its gun (pun intended, story here) and indicted Hunter on the three gun charges. Biden’s team tried to postpone the trial, saying he wasn’t ready, didn’t have the money and the aforementioned Second Amendment defense. 

Share

The Verdict:

I think the jury will…

Read more

Cargill spent the morning in the chamber of the Supreme Court while lawyers and justices argued over his bump stocks, which are banned gun accessories. I interviewed Cargill by phone this evening. 

Subscribe now

Mr. Cargill Goes To Washington

What did it feel like to be the subject of a case in the Supreme Court?

“It was a moving experience to be in Washington D.C.,” Cagill replied. “To walk up the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court, see the pillars of justice, then to walk into the hallway and make it to the room where history was been made. Then to see them up close and in person and hear all the questions and speak -- very moving.”

Did you ever want to jump up and say something during the 90-minute hearing?

“Yes,” Cargill said and laughed. “But that’s one place where decorum and procedure is so strict.”

Before jumping into the details of the day, I asked Cargill why should his bump stocks case matter to those of us who don’t own them. 

“It’s all about administrative agencies— whether OSHA,  EPA or ATF,” replied Cargill. “ They can turn millions of people into felons overnight, without Congress having a say.” 

Cargill referenced “Schoolhouse Rock” and how a bill becomes a law by going through both houses of Congress and being signed by the White House. “It’s not because an agency of the federal government creates it,” he emphasized.

Bump Stocks Outlawed

Bump stocks, which let you shoot much faster, were banned by the ATF during the Trump administration. The move came after the worst mass shooting in history in 2017 in Las Vegas. The killer used bump stocks and multiple guns to kill 60 people and wound 500. 

The ATF banned them by issuing an interpretive rule citing an almost 100-year law that made fully automatic “machine guns” require a government permit as applicable to bump stocks. 

Cargill, who owns Central Texas Gun Works in Austin, turned in his last two bump stocks to the local ATF in 2018 when the ruling went into effect. Then he filed suit against the federal government. 

(I’ll tell paid subscribers at the end what happened to Cargill’s surrendered bump stocks.)

Trigger Confusion

The Supreme Court hearing Wednesday focused greatly on the technicalities of how the bump stock does or does not affect how the trigger is pulled.  (You can read the court transcript here.)

Machine guns work by pulling the trigger once and the rifle continues to fire until you let it go or run out of ammo. The debate is whether a person using a bump stock is taking his finger on and off each time the gadget pushes forward and back. 

The justices said they were confused multiple times, even though several said they watched videos to understand the differences. 

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson clearly supported the ban. “It's really not about the operation of the thing. It's about what it can achieve, what it's being used for,” she said. “The function of this trigger is to cause this kind of damage, 800 rounds a second or whatever."

Cargill mocked Jackson for saying any gun can shoot 800 rounds in seconds. 

Agency Rules vs Congress Law

Cargill said the central part of his case has little to do with trigger and mostly to do with the bigger picture of making laws that create felons without going through Congress. 

“It’s clear Congress needs to step in and define what is a machine gun if they are going to put bump stocks in the law,” he said. 

Justice Neil Gorsuch said, “I can certainly understand why these items should be made illegal.” However, he also pointed out that bump stocks were legal for so long and now an “interpretive rule...saying otherwise that would render between a quarter of a million and a half million people federal felons."

Justice Brett Kavanaugh said the ATF changing the interpretation of this law after all these years “ensnare a lot of people who are not aware of the legal prohibition.”

“Intuitively, I am entirely sympathetic to your argument,” Justice Amy Coney Barrett told Principal Deputy Solicitor General Brian Fletcher, arguing for the government. “I think the question is, why didn’t Congress pass that legislation to make this cover it more clearly?”

Cargill said he doubts the federal government— the Biden administration— has enough “political capital” to have Congress pass a law making bump stock illegal specifically. 

Second Amendment Relevant?

Why wasn’t the Second Amendment cited today in court for a gun case? 

“We didn't argue the Second Amendment stance at all in this - whether bump stocks are Second Amendment issues,” he said. “My attorneys are constitutional attorneys and focus on the administrative side of it.”

One question survey on audio version

Justice Kavanaugh asked Cargill’s lawyer, former Texas solicitor general Jonathan Mitchell, why he didn’t argue the Second Amendment in this case.

“We didn't argue that because courts are generally loath to decide constitutional questions when there's an easy statutory off-ramp,” replied Mitchell. He added that the Second Amendment defense would raise the question if bump stocks fall “within the dangerous and unusual weapons carveout in Heller. ” Mitchell said that exception is “vague enough that it's just not clear to us what the answer would be.”

Supreme Court Decision

Even some of the conservative justices seemed to think banning bump stocks was a legitimate gun law, but they differed on whether it could be done through the ATF. Cargill feels good about the ruling. 

“We are excited about how things went today. We are pretty optimistic that the Supreme Court will see it in our way and hopefully decide this whole case in my favor,” he said. 

Share

But Cagill did not get all positive news after court. While we were talking, he pulled up emails through his store’s website today with truly hateful comments and wishing him dead. 

Read more

Note to readers: Some of you avidly follow news related to gun control and advocate for Second Amendment rights and wanted to know more about Biden’s granddaughter’s Secret Service detail shooting at car thieves.

However, most of you do not follow crime in depth. I wanted to make this story accessible to everyone. So let’s start at the beginning.

First-time gun owner

I’ve reported on crime in D.C. for over a dozen years since I walked into a burglar in the house. He stole my wallet and made his way out the door.

After the police left, I was scared that if he had been violent, I would not have had a way to defend myself.

Subscribe now

I decided to buy a gun for home self-defense. In doing so, I found the laws in D.C. made it extremely difficult to exercise my Second Amendment rights.

I wrote about buying and registering a gun to keep at home and, in the process, forced the City Council to change the laws. (My very first story on wanting a gun is here.)

Don't shoot first

Becoming a gun owner was a huge decision because it meant I had to accept that I had the power to end someone’s life.

Along the way, I learned the legal circumstances for firing a gun – only if my life is in imminent danger or at risk of great bodily harm or someone else’s life. You can’t shoot someone to protect property.

After I became a TV crime reporter,  I also learned that these laws apply to law enforcement too. 

Secret Service shoot-out

Thus, I was quite surprised to learn that a Secret Service agent shot at an attempted car thief outside the home of President Biden’s granddaughter, Naomi.

The Secret Service agents saw up to three people breaking a window on their unoccupied, parked vehicle just before midnight Sunday.

One federal officer “discharged a service weapon” but it was “believed no one was struck.”

This was in the middle of the rich neighborhood, Georgetown, and so it’s lucky no bystanders were shot.

The car thieves got away in a red vehicle and have not been caught. 

Secret Service on attack and defense

I emailed Anthony Guglielmi, the spokesman for the United States Secret Service (USSS), and asked: 

Can you explain why an agent fired to protect property? 

Guglielmi sent me the public statement. I followed up: 

I asked genuinely if you could direct me to the policy or law allowing for federal agents to fire in defense of property because my readers keep asking...”

Guglielmi replied in part that the “encounter” is “under investigation.” (His full email to me is below for paid subscribers.)

The Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) responded to the “Secret Service agent-involved shooting.”

Asked for an update, MPD Officer Hugh Carew told me Tuesday that it “remains under investigation with our Internal Affairs Division’s Force Investigation Team.”

D.C. crime spree

While I am interested in how or why a Secret Service agent could not follow training and shoot at a car thief, this incident brought to a national spotlight the crime wave we have here in the District.

Homicides are up 34% this year.

While Naomi Biden was not carjacked, this story has gotten conflated with that crime in media coverage. That’s probably because carjackings…

Read more

Impact of the Attack

Israel, the tiny democracy in the Middle East with terrorists along all its borders, has more stringent gun-control laws than anywhere in the United States. There is no recognition of the right to keep and bear arms like our Second Amendment.

A mere 1.5% of Israelis have a civilian license to own a gun, even though they are all trained during mandatory military service.

But the day after the horrific terrorist attack, the government suddenly made it slightly easier for its citizens to own firearms for self-defense.

Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir announced in Hebrew an emergency declaration that will “allow as many citizens as possible to arm themselves.” It went into effect in 24 hours.

Strict gun control

You are eligible to apply only if you live or work in the settlement areas (including Gaza) or are employed in professions that use guns — like security guards, police officers or firefighters. Active duty military, military veterans of a certain rank, and special forces can also apply.

(The application is on the Firearm Licensing Department’s website.)

The license allows you to own only one handgun and, until now, 50 rounds of ammunition. You have to apply for another license for any additional guns.

Hurdles to gun ownership

When applying, an individual must provide references, proof of residency for three years and meet the minimum age requirement (based on military service and residency.) Applicants must also prove a basic knowledge of Hebrew and provide a health declaration from a doctor.

The person must pass the interview, pay a licensing fee, buy the gun, and attend 4.5 hours of training at a shooting range.

Applicants can meet all these requirements but still be denied based on criminal convictions, drug use, or certain mental health conditions.

An Israeli who no longer meets all the eligibility requirements must notify the Firearm Licensing Department and deposit their firearm and license at a police station within 72 hours.

Emergency gun rights

The details of Ben-Gvir's emergency policy are relatively small changes.

A person can now buy 100 rounds of ammo.

The laws that require proving “a need” to own and carry a gun have not changed.

However those eligible to apply for a license under the “self-defense test” can now do the required interview on the phone instead of in person. The applicant will be approved for the license within a week under the new order.

According to the minister, 4,000 citizens who applied for a conditional permit in 2023 but let the license expire before using it can now purchase a firearm. Another 1,800 people in the past six months who returned their guns to the government for not taking a training renewal course can get their weapons back.

Gun rights leader

Ben-Gvir has been pushing for more civilian gun ownership to deal with both terrorist attacks and crime since he took office at the beginning of this year. He made it easier to get permits by adding staff to process the licenses. He expanded those qualified to apply to include more veterans and medic volunteers. 

"I want more weapons on the streets so that the citizens of Israel can defend themselves,” he said in January.

By early June, the Jerusalem Post reported that new licenses jumped by 280% compared to the same four-month period in 2022.

He made it easier to get permits and said in August that his policies led to an 88% increase in the amount of women receiving firearms licenses. “Women that want to defend themselves and their families is a blessed thing,” said Ben-Gvir.

Share

Israel at war

I weighed writing or sending you this newsletter…

Read more

Read more

Share

This same total ban on carrying guns in public was law in Washington, D.C. for decades, but it was passed by the city council. Grisham said her executive action for a 30-day “suspension” of Second Amendment rights was legal because “no constitutional right...is intended to be absolute.”

The COVID era of executive powers in the name of a fake health emergency is alarming.

New Mexico’s gun-free zone

The governor’s order (here) bans all open and concealed carry of guns in Bernalillo County and prohibits guns on public property. The order even applies to legal permit holders. The civil violation comes with a $5,000 fine.

Grisham, a Democrat, said her decision was in response to three incidents of children being shot and killed and “mass shootings.”

She said at a press conference, “The purpose is to try to create a cooling-off period while we figure out how we can better address public safety and gun violence.”

She doesn’t even pretend that it will do anything to reduce gun violence.

A reporter asked her, “Do you really think criminals are going to hear this message and not carry a gun in Albuquerque— on the streets— for 30 days?"

“No,” Grisham replied, “I do think it's a pretty resounding message to everybody else in that community to report a crime, to tell us what's going on, to aid law enforcement.”

Opposition from all sides

The mayor of Albuquerque, the police chief, and the Bernalillo County District Attorney (a Democrat) said they won’t enforce the “unconstitutional” order. The state police are ordered to do it, though they reportedly did not give out fines to the protesters open carrying on Sunday.

Two gun-rights groups — Gun Owners of America and the National Association for Gun Rights — both filed lawsuits over the weekend to try to get the ban lifted by a court.

Even gun control activists said publicly they oppose it. Rep. Ted Lieu (D-CA) tweeted, “There is no such thing as a state public health emergency exception to the U.S. Constitution.” Activist David Hogg tweeted the exact same thing, showing they were clearly coordinated.

COVID executive superpowers

The governor also said that it’s likely she will renew the gun ban after the 30-day period. It reminds me of the “15 days to slow the spread” that started months of lockdowns by the federal government.

Grisham said openly that she was going around the legislature.

“It's lawful in New Mexico to have firearms… It's not like I can create a new a new law or a standard. So what I can do is, when you violate a public health order, it's the lowest level of violation,” she said.

Two Republican legislators have called on Grisham to be impeached.

Washington’s same ban, pre-COVID

It seems everyone agrees that the New Mexico governor is wrong, but there was much less outrage when this was law in D.C. for decades. I pulled up the story I wrote in 2014 when U.S. District Court Judge Frederick Scullin, Jr. overturned the ban in Palmer v District of Columbia. He wrote:

There is no longer any basis on which this Court can conclude that the District of Columbia's total ban on the public carrying of ready-to-use handguns outside the home is constitutional under any level of scrutiny.

Attorney Alan Gura fought the case for five long years. 

“We won!” Alan Gura, the lead attorney for the plaintiffs said in a phone interview.  “I’m very pleased with the decision that the city can’t forbid the exercise of a fundamental constitutional right.”

Gura told me at the time that he expected the District to appeal this decision, but the city did not. Another case two years later forced the city to drop the part of the law that made people (like me) prove a need for a carry permit.

Share

New Mexico gun grab

Read more

In my book that came out 10 years ago this month, I wrote that the term “gun show loophole” was invented to give the public the false impression that these conventions are hotbeds of criminal activity. Now, Pres. Joe Biden is closing this nonexistent loophole based on the unsubstantiated claim that it will keep guns away from criminals.

Subscribe now

Biden’s takes a shot 

Biden is making gun control a central theme of his reelection campaign and using executive action to bypass Congress.

The White House announced Thursday that the Justice Department’s proposed a new rule that is being heralded as closing the “gun show loophole.” The term refers to private sales at gun shows that activists have long claimed are how criminals get guns.

If enacted, the rule would require you to get a federal firearms license from the ATF when you are “offering a firearm for sale to make money, and telling a customer that you can purchase and sell him additional firearms.”

Gun control advocates say the rule will be even stricter. John Feinblatt, the president of Everytown (Mike Bloomberg’s group) tweeted Tuesday the Biden rule is “simple” — anyone who sells at a gun show is “presumed to be trying to make a profit, and you need to run background checks on your customers.”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) tweeted:

the admin moved to close the "gun show loophole" & expand common-sense background checks. President Biden is standing up to the gun lobby and saving lives.

Gun control expands

I asked “the gun lobby” — aka the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) which represents firearms manufacturers and federally licensed firearms dealers— about the celebration. Mark Oliva, NSSF’s managing director of public affairs, said:

Those politicians making assertions of loopholes are, fact, rights that belong to “The People.” Attempts to deprive those rights, like what seems to be the case with the Biden administration’s most recent proposed rule, are unconstitutional. 

According to the White House fact sheet on the rule, the goal is to achieve “universal background checks.” That means every private sale of a gun goes through the government’s background check database. 

Oliva said universal background checks “would necessitate a national firearm registry” which is “expressly forbidden by federal law.” 

Are gun shows dangerous?

Politicians and activists have long made us believe that gun shows are where criminals go to buy firearms. Biden said in 2021:

Most people don’t know — you walk into a store and you buy a gun, you have a background check. But you go to a gun show, you can buy whatever you want and no background check.

No, Mr. President, you can’t. I explained in my book that at least 90% of sales at gun shows are done by licensed dealers who run background checks.

Solution without a problem

Gun control groups like to cite an ATF report this year that traced 9,089 crime guns in 2021 to licensed dealers at gun shows. That is 2% of the guns ATF traced from crimes that year.

The stat is irrelevant because the “gun show loophole” is about whether private sellers at gun shows that don’t do background checks are supplying criminals with guns. The ATF said it couldn’t trace those guns to know.

Anyway, the traced guns were probably stolen. Surveys of inmates by the Justice Department showed that less than 1% of criminals claimed to have gotten their firearms at a gun show.

The myth of the “gun show loophole” worked for so long because people like me— women, people living on the coasts and most of the mainstream media— have not been to one of these conventions. Most people buy their guns at stores. Less than 4% of all firearms are sold at gun shows.

Share

Gun dealers redefined

Even though Biden’s action is being heralded in the media as closing the gun show loophole, the real issue is that it is redefining who is engaged in business when selling guns…

Read more

Share

Plea deal break

On Tuesday, Special Counsel David Weiss stated in this filing that Biden's plea deal to dismiss charges of firearm possession while using drugs "never went into effect" and that "none of its terms are binding on either party." The deal would have expunged Hunter's record of gun charges after two years of sobriety and other probation conditions.

Biden had claimed in a filing Monday that the Justice Department was trying to “renege” on a settlement — that also gave him immunity for future charges — that was “valid and binding.”

Biden was charged in June for possessing a firearm for several weeks in October 2018. He confessed in his memoir to being on crack cocaine when he bought the revolver in Delaware. He faces 10 years in prison on the charge.

Drugs and guns

The Gun Control Act of 1968 made it illegal under federal law to have a gun while being “an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance.” It has been applied to anyone who has used drugs in the past 12 months and includes marijuana users, even in the states that have legalized it.

Hunter’s lawyers said he was going to challenge the law at trial based on the Supreme Court landmark ruling New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. Two months later, his defense was successfully used by a convicted drug user.

Pot and guns

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit last week overturned Patrick Daniels’s conviction for having marijuana and guns.

Daniels was pulled over in Mississippi last year and arrested for having several marijuana butts along with two loaded firearms (a pistol and rifle) in his car. Daniels was not charged with driving under the influence.

Once in custody, he admitted to being a regular pot smoker. He was convicted by a jury for illegally possessing the firearms as a prohibited person and sentenced to four years in prison.

Supreme Court effect

The judges ruled in favor of Daniels, asserting that having firearms and marijuana while presumably sober satisfied the Supreme Court's Bruen test.  (Read the 44-page opinion in USA vv Daniels here.)

Judge Jerry Smith stated that "even as a marijuana user, Daniels is a member of our political community" and therefore has a "presumptive right to bear arms," in line with the Second Amendment's text.

Regarding the requirement that gun control laws must resemble those existing during the nation's founding, Smith added:

...our history and tradition may support some limits on an intoxicated person’s right to carry a weapon, but it does not justify disarming a sober citizen based exclusively on his past drug usage. 

Hunter’s rights

The federal judges wrote that their ruling only applies to Daniels, not the broader law on all drugs. It’s also different than Hunter’s alleged possession while intoxicated, but the precedent could be used at his trial. 

Jake Charles, a professor at Pepperdine University Law School, tweeted about the USA v Daniels decision:

Hunter Biden’s 922(g)(3) charge would have to be dismissed under this ruling.

Charles also wrote that the government is “gonna have trouble” with the charge “now that the 5th Circuit has said it violates the Second Amendment.”

Subscribe now

I’ve reported for over a decade that there is not a single gun control law that has reduced gun crime. But are we better off as a society now that drug users can have guns, and the police can’t arrest them?

If Patrick Daniels got off, shouldn’t Hunter Biden’s gun charges get dropped?

Debate is open to paid subscribers in the comments….

Leave a comment

Read more

When I wrote just over a month ago that the president’s son got a sweetheart deal for illegally owning a gun, it never occurred to me that a judge would blow up the deal. That shocking move happened today, which forced Hunter’s lawyers and the Department of Justice back into negotiations.

Subscribe now

No Rubber Stamp

“It seems to me like you are saying ‘Just rubber stamp the agreement, Your Honor,’” U.S. District Court Judge Maryellen Noreika Delaware said in a Delaware courtroom. “This seems to me to be form over substance.”

Hunter was charged by DOJ in June with felony possession of a firearm despite knowing he was addicted to crack cocaine. He was supposed to enter into a  “pre-trial diversion” agreement, which meant his record would be wiped clear of the gun charge if he adhered to the terms of the plea deal for two years. But the judge said that deal won’t work.

Gun Deal Dropped

Noreika said that mixing immunity on a gun charge with a guilty plea on tax charges was not constitutional, Fox News reported 

The judge, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, said that the deal would make the court responsible for monitoring Biden’s actions. According to the AP, the judge said “the lawyers needed to untangle technical issues — including over her role in enforcing the gun agreement — before moving forward.”

Share

Biden was going to plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax offenses, but he ended up pleading not guilty.

Under Investigation

The other issue that broke down the deal was whether immunity on the gun charge would apply to possible future charges in the ongoing investigation…

Read more

I interviewed the company’s CEO Kai Kloepfer by phone and asked him the questions you posed in this chat thread. He answered every one of your questi…

Read more

Hunter was charged with “unlawful possession of a firearm by a person prohibited” and faced a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.

However, the Justice Department said Hunter will enter “a pre-trial diversion agreement with regard to the firearm charge.” This means his record will be wiped clean after a couple of years of probation.

“I think a poor African American or white defendant charged with the same thing would not get this kind of a deal,” Larry Keane, the general counsel of the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) told me.

The NSSF, which represents federally licensed gun dealers, also said in a statement that it is “frustrated by this no prosecution agreement.”

Share

The gun charge is for “knowing that he was an unlawful user of and addicted to a controlled substance” and “did knowingly possess a firearm, that is, a Colt Cobra 38SPL revolver.” See here:

Read more

Crime has tripled on the Washington Metro this year. Two teenagers were shot and killed this month on the city’s subway system in separate incidences. A Metro employee was killed in D.C. while trying to save a woman from a gunman. Three others were shot in that rampage. 

Public transportation is dangerous in the nation’s capital.

Note: Scroll down for the laws for gun conceal carry permit holders on the D.C. metro

The drastic crime spike adds pressure to a lawsuit against the District for prohibiting people who have a license to carry a pistol concealed from exercising their Second Amendment rights because the whole Metrorail system is a gun-free zone.

“Every day on the Metro, more people become victims of violent crimes while law-abiding carry permit holders are denied their right to defend themselves,” George Lyon, who is the attorney for the four plaintiffs in Angelo v District of Columbia, told me in an interview. 

Illegal guns on trains

On Sunday, a 17-year-old was shot multiple times and killed midday inside the train car that was traveling to the Waterfront Metro Station — which is just blocks from the Nationals’ baseball stadium.

The police said the suspect and the victim, Brendan Ofori of Maryland, got into an altercation on the train. The suspect (photo below from surveillance video) has not been arrested by Wednesday night. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Department told me the case remains under investigation.

A few weeks ago, D.C. police said 18-year-old Tenneson Vaughn Leslie was killed in a Metro station by a 16-year-old (who then jumped on a train) with a 14-year-old accomplice.

A stupid criminal got a lot of coverage last week when he jumped the turnstiles in a Metro station in Pentagon City while carrying guns.

Demarcus Anthony Henderson (above) of Washington resisted accepting the fare evasion citation and refused to show identification.  So, the Metro Transit Police arrested him and found the two handguns (photo below) and brass knuckles.

Henderson was charged with carrying concealed firearms without a permit. (I give you specific details below about how the carry gun laws are different on the Metro in Virginia, Maryland and D.C. below.)

Crime surge

Looking at Metro Transit Police crime statistics (here), the total serious crimes on the transit system up to the end of April jumped from 222 last year to 616 this year.

The number of secondary-level crimes –  including simple assault, drug offenses and indecent exposure – went from 1,000 last year to 2,265 as of April 30 this year.

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said in February after the shooting spree of four people that she would increase the police presence on the system, but it hasn’t helped.

The police stats show police are cracking down on fare evasion, with an increase from 115 to 607 arrests so far this year. However, Metro riders say they still see people jumping the turnstiles constantly.

Subways and Gun Carry

When the D.C. city council started to allow some people to get carry permits in 2015 (that’s when I became the first woman to get one), it limited where guns could be carried. The council blocked out large parts of the city (full list here) claiming those are considered “sensitive” places, which included the Metro system. Recently New York City added the same restriction on its subway.

All these laws are being challenged since the Supreme Court ruled last June that only five places were considered “sensitive” at the founding of the country, and none of them were related to transportation. 

D.C. sued over conceal carry on Metro

Lyon of Arsenal Attorneys told me Wednesday that his clients have been waiting months for a ruling from the judge in their ongoing case.

The basis of their case is that their right to bear arms is being violated every day because they are not allowed to carry loaded guns on the cost-effective Metro. The men all have D.C. concealed carry permits and take the Metro on a regular basis.

U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss (an Obama appointee) denied the plaintiffs’ motion for injunctive relief last year. He also ruled that the men don’t have standing in the case because they can’t prove a “credible threat of prosecution” — meaning none of them have been threatened with arrest.

Lyon addressed the standing issue but then upped the ante by filing suit against the Metro Transit Police Chief and the District’s Attorney General Brian Schwalb. He told me that if the judge rules against them on any of the matters, they will appeal.

Conceal Carry DMV

The gun laws and Metro system in D.C. are probably the most complicated in the nation. The District, Virginia and Maryland are all closely connected by the Metro. Here are the main points:

• The District gives carry permits to a citizen of any state.

• D.C. permits are valid in Virginia but not Maryland.

• Virginia and Maryland permits are …not valid in D.C.

• Virginia and Maryland allow for concealed carry on their parts of Metro.

  • This is why Henderson (the turnstile jumper) was charged with carrying without a permit instead of illegal possession of an unregistered firearm and ammunition when he was arrested.

  • One of the plaintiffs in the Angelo case is a Virginia resident.

• Virginia and Maryland residents with D.C. permits are required to unload their firearms and put them in locked cases before they enter the city on any Metro bus or train.

  • I asked a police spokesman for details on how this works in practice and was sent a line to the complex transport laws here.

    Share

How I Legally Brought a Gun on the Metro

Read more

Well, that was shortsighted.

Subscribe now

Gun Control Switchback

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) signed gun-control bills into law on Tuesday that are in direct defiance of the Supreme Court ruling in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen last June.

These new laws (listed here) drastically restrict where people can legally carry a gun and make it harder and much more expensive to get a carry permit. 

Gun-control groups Moms Demand Action, the Brady Campaign and Giffords took a victory lap and praised Moore for tackling “gun violence.”

Knowingly Unconstitutional

As I’ve done for over 10 years when Maryland changes its gun control laws, I called Mark Pennak of Maryland Shall Issue (MSI) for a legal analysis. Pennak this evening was literally in the middle of filing a new lawsuit against the state when he picked up the phone. (The NRA filed one too.)

I asked him about the governor claiming that restricting where permit holders can carry guns would make people safer. 

“The idea that this will have an impact on crime is ludicrous,” Pennak said. “This will just mean more people will be unable to legally protect themselves. It won’t do a thing to the criminals because they all carry illegally.”

Pennak, who is a constitutional lawyer, said the part of the new laws that is most contradictory to Bruen is that all private places are gun-free zones unless explicitly permitted.

“The presumptive ban on public carry is clearly unconstitutional, and they know it,” said Pennak. “You have to assume every place that is privately owned is banned-- every store, every restaurant. So you can have your gun with you in the McDonald’s drive-through, but then you can’t go inside.”

Specifics

The Supreme Court’s Bruen decision says that guns can be banned in “sensitive places” but only these five: schools, government buildings, legislative assemblies, courthouses and polling places. Maryland just ignored the ruling and called “sensitive places” everything from a health care facility to a museum.

If you live in Maryland and need specific details on where you can and can’t legally carry as of Oct. 1, go to this page on the MSI website. I’ve noticed the news stories on this new law are mixing up a proposed bill and the final one.

The new law also raised fees by 50% for the “Wear and Carry” permit, from $75 to $125 to get a permit and from $50 to $75 to renew. Pennak said that the “dramatic hike that is past the point where it’s reasonable” will mean the state could be making a profit, which is not allowed under case law.

Share

Gun Violence Circles

As I previously wrote about growing up in Baltimore, the laws were extremely restrictive. My father had one of the few carry permits. My stepdad was armed, at least at home:

One day my stepfather called me and my sister into the bedroom and tossed two handguns on the bed. He told us those guns were in his sock drawer and to never touch them. That was my first gun safety lesson in life. We all know better now.

So I genuinely thought

Read more

Subscribe now

Washington and Illinois 

The NSSF reported that adjusted background checks (which closely approximate sales) went up a whopping 46% in Washington state in April compared to last year.

In Illinois, NSSF’s adjusted background checks in April 2023 were up 12% over the same month last year. To put this in perspective, background checks increased 0.7% in the same time period for the whole country.  

“These figures are clear evidence that Americans will choose freedom over unconstitutional laws that deny Constitutionally-protected liberties,” NSSF’s Mark Oliva told me. 

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed a bill into law last month that bans the sale and transfer of more than 50 types of AR-15 and AK-style rifles. The exact number of background checks, which happens when people buy guns from federally licensed dealers, went from 49,641 in April 2022 to 71,272 in April 2023. 

The Illinois legislature passed an “assault weapon” ban after the mass shooting killing seven people at the Highland Park Fourth of July parade. Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s signed the bill into law in January. Dan Eldridge, the owner of Maxon’s Shooter’s Supplies in Illinois, has the most detailed FAQ about the complicated law on his website here. 

“These figures show that when Americans are concerned that government authorities will deny them the full spectrum of their Second Amendment rights, they will respond by exercising those rights,” Oliva said of the statistics.

“It also shows that when barriers to lawful firearm ownership are torn down, law-abiding citizens will exercise their right to lawfully purchase firearms.”

Oregon and North Carolina

Barriers were torn down in North Carolina in March when it passed a law that got rid of the requirement to get a permit to buy a handgun. As a result, background checks – i.e. sales – blew up 238%. 

The legislature overturned Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto so that people can now buy pistols by passing the federal FBI background check system instead of getting a permit from the sheriff. Background checks went from 18,967 in April 2022 to 68,181 last month— most likely because it’s just easier to legally buy a gun now.

Sales were up double digits for the reverse reason in Oregon. 

The NSSF report showed a huge jump in Oregon – 56% – from last year which the lobbying group says is due to “a legislature and governor’s office hostile to lawful firearm ownership.” 

Assault Weapon Facts

There are now 10 states with “assault weapon” bans and all are being challenged in court for violating the landmark Supreme Court 2022 decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen. The ruling said that any gun control law has to come from the text of the constitution or have a similar law in place at the founding of the nation.

The NSSF noted that it recently won a decision by a federal judge that block the Illinois law against what it calls “modern sporting rifles.” 

When Inslee signed the Washington bill into law, he said at the signing, “These weapons of war, assault weapons, have no reason other than mass murder.” Inslee also said the gun’s “only purpose is to kill humans as rapidly as possible in large numbers.”

This is not true. The AR-15-style rifle – called an assault weapon by politicians – is the most popular gun in America and is rarely used in murders. The NSSF estimates there are 24 million in the U.S. now.

Share

The FBI data for 2021 shows that 447 homicides were by rifle of any kind.  This FBI does not track rifles by type so there is no data on “assault weapons”, but even if all those homicides were by AR-type rifles (which they are not), it is just…

Read more

As president, Donald Trump privately pushed for banning AR-15-type rifles, according to a new report. Trump was — and is — a big defender of Second Amendment rights. So the new revelation is surprising that he tried to renew the “assault weapon” ban during his first two years in office.

Subscribe now

Need for AR-15

The news about Trump is buried in a lengthy story in The Washinton Post on Monday about AR-15 style rifles. The report says he tried multiple times in 2018 and 2019 to get support for a federal “assault-weapon” ban.

In the summer of 2019, after back-to-back mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso involving an AR-15-style pistol and an AKM-style rifle, Trump told aides that he wanted to ban AR-15s, according to people present for the statements.

“I don’t know why anyone needs an AR-15,” Trump told aides as he flew on Marine One to the White House in August 2019, according to a person who heard his comments.

As one former official put it in describing the real estate developer turned politician, “His reflexes were a New York liberal on guns. He doesn’t have knee-jerk conservative reflexes.”

But Trump was also petrified of the NRA and others taking him on, former advisers said, and heard from a number of advisers that it would be unpopular. Trump ultimately stopped entertaining the idea of working with Democrats on gun control later that year, when he was caught in a scandal over his now-infamous phone call with Ukraine’s president.

“F--- it, I’m not going to work with them on anything. They’re f---ing impeaching me,” Trump said in one Oval Office meeting, according to a participant.

The AR-15 is a style of rifle. The FBI crime statistics for 2021 show there were 11,628 people killed by guns, and 447 of them were by rifles of any type. The bureau does not track the style of the rifle.

A spokesman for Trump, who is running for reelection in 2024, did not deny the remarks. From The Post:

Steven Cheung, a Trump spokesman, did not respond to detailed findings in this article but said that “there had been no bigger defender of the Second Amendment than President Trump.” He said that Trump had offered other proposals after mass shootings, such as adding security guards to schools and allowing teachers who are licensed to carry a weapon to do so.

Trump’s bipartisan gun control

While this reporting from The Post is from anonymous sources, it lines up with Trump’s public comment in 2018 in a bipartisan White House meeting on gun control measures after the horrific school mass shooting in Parkland, FL.  

Trump told Sen. Dianne Feinstein in a live TV meeting that he would look at her “assault weapon” ban bill. It caused an uproar with the pro-gun groups that helped get him elected. I cued up this video to watch him tell her: 

NRA protest

The Post reported this meeting and one other in more detail:

Shortly after Parkland, President Donald Trump repeatedly floated the idea of supporting a new assault weapons ban.

He mentioned it on live television to one of the Senate’s most vocal gun-control backers, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), and in a private meeting with Parkland families. His comments rattled NRA officials and some of his own advisers.

NRA representatives later warned Trump against taking action. “They came up here and said to him, the base is going to blow you up,” according to a former official who sat in during a series of meetings with the NRA. They, like others interviewed for this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private interactions.

Trump supported the NRA in the same 2018 meeting with Feinstein and others (transcript here):

I’m a fan of the NRA.  I mean, there’s no bigger fan.  I’m a big fan of the NRA.  They want to do it.  These are great people.  These are great patriots.  They love our country.  But that doesn’t mean we have to agree on everything. 

The not agreeing on everything is a reference to the issue of raising the federal minimum age for owning a gun from 18 to 21 years old.

AR-15 media bias

Read more

Murdaugh is not accused of using an automatic rifle, despite that being reported in huge media news outlets. This widespread error shows a broader problem of media credibility.

* UPDATE 2/17: After my story came out, all the outlets I cited corrected their reports (except CBS.) I’ve added screen caps of their original reporting below.

We have been watching the trial closely and discussing details in this thread on the Substack app chat. Jump in here:

The prosecution is expected to rest its case on Friday on the double murder in South Carolina. At the same time, the media elite wrongly report that the gun in the horrific murder is more deadly than the one presented at trial

Fully auto

As I write this on Thursday night, the biggest media outlets in the country are reporting this: 

Maggie Murdaugh was shot four or five times with an automatic rifle just outside the kennels, while her son was shot twice with a shotgun inside a long closet where dog food and other supplies were kept.

The “automatic rifle” is factually incorrect. A semi-automatic, AR-type rifle was used based on the casings left behind.

The prosecution has given no evidence or even suspicion that Murdaugh owned or used an automatic rifle.

That type of rifle, which fires multiple times when the trigger is pulled, is highly regulated by the ATF. It has not been used in a murder since the mid-1980s.

During the trial, pathologist Ellen Riemer testified about the autopsy report. She said Maggie was shot repeatedly with a semi-automatic rifle (which she called an “assault weapon.”) The first three shots to her abdomen and legs were so painful that she fell over or to her knees.

The rifle was never found, but the casings matching the ones at the murder scene were found on Murdaugh’s hunting plantation.

Nevertheless, these major news outlets are currently reporting that it was an “automatic rifle”.

*These screen captures show what the media reported before my story was published. Click through the links to see their corrected stories.

The Washington Post

ABC News

CBS News

U.S. News and World Report.

AP’s outside influence

The reason for the big media outlets reporting that Murdaugh used a more dangerous gun is because they all picked up the story from the Associated Press (AP) wire service.

The AP’s media relations did not respond to my request for comment.

The AP reporter in South Carolina who wrote the story, Jeffrey Collins, tweeted it to be juicy and dramatic. 

While Collins is the source that started everyone else reporting the wrong firearm used to murder Maggie Murdaugh, all the other outlets have editors who could have corrected the error before publication.

**I write more about mainstream journalists refusing the learn the basics of firearms for paid subscribers below.

Subscribe now

It’s not like the AP doesn’t know the correct terms. Returning to my story a few months ago about how AP Style Guide alerted the media to stop using the phrase “assault weapon.”

Emily Posts News

Assault weapon, assault rifle ‘politicized’ terms that media have to stop using, per AP Stylebook

The AP Stylebook is like a mix of the dictionary and a bible for journalists. We use the reference book to know how to correctly write out terms on any subject, punctuate and adhere to a consistent standard. When the gods who run the Associated Press guide make a change, it reverberates through the media as we are expected to adhere to it…

Read more

4 years ago · 19 likes · 54 comments · Emily Miller

The AP said the term is biased because it refers to the cosmetic features of a gun. The style guide said reporters should use the accurate term “semi-automatic rifle.” (As I wrote at the time, the “semi-automatic” adjective is unnecessary because automatic rifles are not used in crimes.)

Media credibility rock bottom

This is the gazillionth time big media outlets have made errors on simple facts related to firearms. They seem to think that they can make the same mistakes over and over and expect their credibility with the readers to stay the same.

That’s not right. This chart that Axios made based on Gallup polling shows the public doesn’t trust TV news and newspapers.

It shows that the least trusted institution in America is Congress (as always) and the second least trusted is TV news. So you see why ABC and CBS News making an error with the most popular rifle in America (the AR style) will make readers think even less of their reporting.

Gun questions in the trial

Those of us who are knowledgeable about guns have been wondering about the strange firearm-related narratives in the state’s case. Can you answer or illuminate any of these? Leave a comment…

1. Headshot graze — How did Cousin Eddie shoot Murdaugh in the head on that faked suicide attempt and only graze him? A trained shooter who is sober would have trouble only hitting the edge of the head. 

2. Why were two guns -- a shotgun and a rifle used? It would be very difficult to carry two long guns, put one down, shoot the shotgun twice as Paul was moving toward the suspect, put down the shotgun, pick up the rifle and shoot Maggie up to five times.

   One theory is if Murdaugh planned the crime in advance, he wanted it to look like there were multiple shooters. But, even if there really were multiple suspects, why did they use different styles of heavy guns?

3. If Alec is guilty, why didn’t he use the handgun he said was in his car? It likely would have been a much faster death with less suffering and a less messy crime scene to clean. 

4. Why didn’t Maggie run to Paul or away from the scene when Paul was shot? If Alex was the only shooter, when he put down the shotgun after killing Paul, there was a window before using the rifle to kill Maggie. 

Leave a comment

Alex Murdaugh trial fascination

Americans are glued to this trial because Murdaugh is rich and a lawyer and privileged. Three generations of the Murdaughs have been the prosecutors in this county and put away many criminals. Alex had the power to prosecute for months after he allegedly murdered his family. The state says his professional knowledge and connections gave him the ability to meticulously plan the murder of his family and get away with it. 

Can the elite get away with murder? Are there two systems of justice in our country— one for regular people and another rich and powerful?

Share

*Deliberate gun errors in reporting 

Read more

Subscribe now

This comes after Podium paid to advertise, bought exhibition space at the nation’s largest firearms trade show and actively pursued business with gun dealers, according to documents from the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF). Podium said it wanted to “lean into the world of guns” before changing policies.

“Woke businesses like Podium are choosing to side with gun control and implement boardroom policies that discriminate against the Constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans and a lawful industry,” Larry Keane, the NSSF’s Senior Vice President for Government & Public Affairs & General Counsel told me. “It’s bad business.”

Local gun store canceled

Jessica Keffer is the vice president of the Sportsman’s Shop, a popular gun store in East Earl, Penn. She said that she has been paying Podium $360 a month for the past year to manage their online chats and text messages with customers. 

Keffer said Podium emailed her “out of the blue” to say that her account was being “deactivated.” (That email is pasted at the bottom of this story. It links to these “Terms and Conditions.”)

“It’s infuriating,” Keffer said in a phone interview. “We are a legal business, doing things the right way. And I should be able to advertise and promote my business as such. And I can’t do that because of what we sell.”

Keffer reported that Podium got her store from 300 to 800 Google reviews, which increased their search ranking. 

“The irony is we had tremendous success with it. Podium had a significant impact for good for our business,” Keffer said. “And then we get -- sorry we won’t do business with you and more -- and no explanation.” 

Podium did not respond to requests for comment about its changed policies.

Podium advertised to gun dealers

Keffer said Podium approached her larger buy group to pitch their services. I discovered that was one part of a much larger effort by Podium to get gun industry business. 

The NSSF, which represents firearm manufacturers and gun dealers, says Podium bought exhibition space in 2021 and 2022 at SHOT Show, their massive annual trade show and pursued the industry.

NSSF provided me with emails from Podium — which are at the bottom of this story — asking for the business. One from 2020 says:

We are very interested and excited to lean into the world of guns and get many of these stores modernize in the way they do business to ensure longevity.

Also, Podium paid to advertise in one of the NSSF’s weekly email newsletters last year and purchased exhibitor space at a large range and retailer exhibition in Florida.

Keane called this decision a “180” and said in a statement: 

Podium’s decision to turn tail and discriminate against lawful businesses that provide for the exercise of the Second Amendment by law-abiding Americans is reprehensible.

It’s unknown how many firearms dealers use Podium after all the advertising, but the company says in its promotional materials that it powers more than 100,000 local businesses to facilitate millions of customer interactions and payment transactions.  Along with firearms, Podium now refuses to work with companies that sell alcohol.

Competitor steps in

Keffer said her store has switched to using a competitor called Otter Text. Although she said it is a smaller company and doesn’t have all the same features as Podium, she is able to speak directly to the owner which she “loves.”

Otter has an advertising campaign on this website directly hitting at alcohol and firearms customers who were “kicked off” Podium.

Keffer said the transition has been “frustrating” because Podium “made it very difficult” to extract the contact information for the subscribers that signed on with her store through the service.  Otter notes that “Podium does not have an easy way to export your data.” 

Share

Asked why she decided to go public about Podium canceling her store, Keffer said she had to speak up against discrimination against her industry by social media, banks and now a marketing firm.

“My motto has always been that I don't want to quietly go into the night,” she said. “I want to make sure we don't miss the chance to correct the incorrect things.”

Leave a comment

EMAILS FROM PODIUM

Read more