Has California reached an upper limit on what it can do to regulate guns?
Following a pattern as old as gun control itself, state lawmakers are responding to back-to-back mass shootings that killed 18 people this week with more legislation:
Democratic Senators Catherine Blakespear of Encinitas and Nancy Skinner of Oakland announced on Thursday that they will present a first-in-the-nation proposal that would require gun owners to purchase liability insurance to cover “negligent or accidental” misuse of their firearms. If that sounds familiar, San Jose has a similar local ordinance.
- Blakespear, in a statement: “Firearms are similar to automobiles in that they are inherently dangerous and in wide circulation. If a car accidentally causes injury to a person or property, the insurance policy will indemnify the victim. The same approach should be applied to injuries caused by firearms.
Assemblywoman Laurie Davies, Republican of San Juan Capistrano, introduced a bill that would require the state Department of Justice to share all relevant information about individuals in the state’s Armed Prohibited Persons System, a database of Californians legally prohibited from owning firearms, with local law enforcement agencies. Davies cited CalMatters reports of the system’s layered and sometimes lethal failures.
And earlier this week, Sen. Dave Min, a Costa Mesa Democrat who recently announced he will run for Congress, introduced a bill that would require all federally licensed gun dealers to take an annual training course on “Responsible Selling Practices.”
Meanwhile, a bill to revamp the state’s concealed-carry permit system is still being worked out after the US Supreme Court struck down the state’s old one and the Legislature failed to pass a replacement last fall.
If all of these bills seem to touch the edges of the state’s gun violence problem, that could be because all the fruits within reach have long since been picked clean. There is much more that California can do on its own.
A sufficiently motivated gun buyer can easily evade state restrictions by buying in Arizona or Nevada, where the rules are much more lax. And California’s existing gun laws are already being scrapped by a more conservative federal judiciary.
That may be why Gov. Gavin Newsom didn’t reveal any new state policy ideas during his visit to Half Moon Bay on Tuesday, instead lashing out at Republicans in Congress.
- Newsom: “We cannot do this alone. And with all due respect, we feel like we are.”
On Thursday morning, a group of Democratic US senators, including Alex Padilla of California, held a press conference to respond to the recent mass shootings, but also to underscore how unlikely new federal legislation is anytime soon. term.
The senators asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate Wee 1 Tactical, a company that produces and sells the “JR-15,” a semi-automatic rifle marketed to children. That gun also helped inspire a new California law.
Padilla said he hopes Congress, despite a Republican majority in the House, can pass new gun restrictions. But not all Democrats were so optimistic.
- Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut: “We don’t need a new law. What we need is compliance.”
