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WV: Proposed WV House Bill Would Expand Castle Doctrine, Strengthen Self-Defense Protections
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The legislation clarifies that a lawful occupant may use reasonable force, including deadly force, against an intruder or attacker inside a home or residence if they reasonably believe the intruder could cause death, serious bodily harm, or intends to commit a felony.
The bill also extends those protections beyond the walls of the home to include the curtilage — areas immediately surrounding a residence, such as yards, driveways, and porches — and removes any duty to retreat when a person is lawfully present. |
WI: Wisconsin gun rights advocates uneasy with Trump comments after Pretti killing
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Some Wisconsin gun rights advocates are uneasy about claims from President Donald Trump and his administration that people can’t carry guns during protests.
The comments and the pushback from Second Amendment groups follows Saturday’s fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis.
Videos of Pretti being shot have sparked public outrage and led to Democrats demanding an end to the surge of agents with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The footage shows one agent removing a handgun from a holster in Pretti’s waistband seconds before he was shot multiple times. |
Donald Trump tries to make gun rights a Minnesota scapegoat
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Trying to shift the blame from federal agents for the killing of an protester against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Minneapolis, President Donald Trump and top administration officials landed on a curious strategy this week: attacking gun rights.
It put the White House very publicly at odds with a key part of the GOP base. |
Democrats exposed as hypocrites on gun rights after fury over Alex Pretti killing
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But let’s not pretend that it’s the Republican officials and solely Republican officials being hypocritical about this. I’ve actually mostly seen criticism of Kash Patel et al from Republicans. So my question is, where do Democrats actually stand on this?
As I mentioned earlier this week, the ACLU, for instance, has backpedaled on whether they support concealed carry rights of protesters. I think many progressives do NOT believe that protesters should be armed. They certainly seem to support every restriction on gun ownership and concealed carry that Democratic legislators can think of. |
CA: Deadly Stockton Flea Market shooting was an act of self-defense during robbery, police say
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A shooting at the Stockton Flea Market earlier this month that left two men dead and a woman wounded has been ruled a case of self-defense during a robbery, Stockton police said on Tuesday.
Stockton police said Wednesday that employees at the business involved are not currently being charged, police said.
Two men were killed and a woman injured when gunfire broke out during the Jan. 19 shooting. Both of those who died were involved in the robbery, police said. Police did not have more information to share about the woman who was wounded.
KCRA 3 previously spoke to Salvador Cervantes, a longtime resident and jewelry business owner at the flea market, who recounted the shooting. |
NM: SB 17 Hearing Today! Oppose the Semi-Automatic Firearm Ban
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This afternoon, Wednesday, January 28, the Senate Health and Public Affairs Committee is scheduled to hear SB 17, an egregious bill to ban the sale of commonly used rifles and shotguns by sportsmen and firearm owners and impose stricter oversight on licensed firearm dealers.
Use the Sportsmen’s Alliance Take Action tool to email the committee and urge them to vote “No” on SB 17. SB 17, the “Stop Illegal Gun Trade Act,” is not about “illegal gun trades,” it’s a direct attack on the equipment and freedom sportsmen and firearm owners rely on for hunting, sport shooting, and self-defense. |
CO: Colorado lawmaker shows hypocrisy of Second Amendment posturing
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Sounds like an actual kill zone.
But on Monday, Liston appeared to blame Pretti for his own death: “He brought a loaded 9mm pistol with two magazines to the demonstration. What kind of a person would bring a loaded handgun to a demonstration to confront the police officers. It’s very unfortunate, but a normal reasonable person would not bring a loaded 9mm handgun to a demonstration.”
...Trump has long been allied with the NRA, and the White House shortly after the inauguration last year took formal action to ensure the right to bear arms is not infringed. Yet Trump has said about Pretti, “You can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns.” |
Trump breaks with NRA as he faults Alex Pretti for carrying a gun
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Yet after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by federal authorities in Minneapolis, Trump has dramatically changed his tune, saying the 37-year-old nurse should not have been carrying a loaded firearm to a protest.
“You can't have guns. You can't walk in with guns. You can’t do that," Trump said on Jan. 27, even as he claimed he wants to reserve judgment on the Pretti case until federal investigations are concluded. "It's just a very unfortunate thing."
Ed.: This is, in fact, the most pro-gun administration in recent history. It is also true that the bar is very low. Hopefully, things get better from here. |
IL: 39-Year-Old Defends Himself During 2 A.M. Robbery, Shooting One Suspect
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The Cragin neighborhood on Chicago’s Northwest Side became a proving ground for self-defense early Tuesday morning. Around 2:40 a.m., a 39-year-old man was exiting his vehicle near the intersection of Montana Street and Laramie Avenue when he was ambushed by two men. One of the suspects brandished a firearm and demanded the man’s belongings, but the encounter did not go as planned for the would-be robbers.
The intended victim, a licensed concealed-carry holder, drew his own firearm and fired multiple rounds, striking one of the 23-year-old suspects in the legs. Chicago police officers arrived on the scene quickly and took both suspects into custody. |
Second Amendment jurisprudence is a mess
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The Supreme Court has made a mess of the law concerning the Second Amendment. Two years ago, in the last Supreme Court decision about the Second Amendment, United States v. Rahimi, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson in a concurring opinion noted how “lower courts are struggling” with recent precedent concerning this amendment and that “confusion plagues the lower courts.”
There are two cases on the docket this term regarding gun laws and they likely will exacerbate, not clear up, the confusion. The court could – and should – solve much of this problem by treating the Second Amendment like other rights in the Constitution. |
Minnesota killing produces backlash against Trump administration from Second Amendment advocates
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Prominent Republicans and gun rights advocates helped elicit a White House turnabout this week after bristling over the administration’s characterization of Alex Pretti, the second person killed this month by a federal officer in Minneapolis, as responsible for his own death because he lawfully possessed a weapon.
The death produced no clear shifts in U.S. gun politics or policies, even as President Donald Trump shuffles the lieutenants in charge of his militarized immigration crackdown. But important voices in Trump's coalition have called for a thorough investigation of Pretti’s death while also criticizing inconsistencies in some Republicans’ Second Amendment stances. |
After Pretti's killing, Trump beats a Second Amendment retreat
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On guns, Republicans suddenly sound like Democrats, and vice versa. Up is down, and down is up.
Consider that for years, Republicans largely argued for unfettered gun access. They said the right to own and bear guns was God-given as they pushed to expand concealed-carry laws. “Good guys with guns,” they said, was an antidote to both random violence and the threat of federal totalitarianism. |
The Trump administration breaks bad on the Second Amendment
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...the killing of 37-year-old Veterans Affairs hospital nurse Alex Pretti by one or perhaps multiple border patrol agents appears to have been, at the very least, an egregious mistake. Video evidence suggests that Pretti, who was legally carrying a pistol, was disarmed prior to the shooting and presented no physical threat to law enforcement despite the fact that he was resisting arrest. Instead of waiting for the findings of an internal investigation, members of the administration decided to launch a full-court press demonizing both the deceased and the fact that Pretti was carrying a weapon. What resulted was a series of the most deranged and un-American statements on gun rights made by Republicans in recent memory, maybe ever. |
Upholding the 2nd Amendment shouldn't hinge on politics
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For years, the conservatives have treated the right to bear arms as holy writ. I’m one of them. As the political left has sought to limit the Second Amendment at every turn, we conservatives have diligently legislated and litigated the right to carry everywhere from the local grocery to the steps of the state capitol. Now that the keys to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are back in familiar hands, the Republican tune has shifted from "molon labe" (come and take them) to "comply or die." |
Trump's response to Pretti killing upends Second Amendment politics
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Alex Pretti was legally carrying a gun when a federal agent shot and killed him in Minneapolis last weekend. President Trump and other federal officials blamed his death on the fact that he had a gun, but Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus chair Bryan Strawser explains why he disagrees.
And, after leading immigration operations in Minneapolis, Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino has returned to his previous job in California. CalMatters investigative reporter Sergio Olmos talks about Bovino’s record in California. |
No guns at protests, Trump says. Your rights explained
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His administration has long advocated for a broad interpretation of the Second Amendment. But then came the Jan. 24 shooting that killed Pretti, which happened weeks after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good in the same city.
Trump told reporters on Jan. 27 he didn’t believe Pretti was an “assassin” but questioned why he was armed.
“You can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns. You can’t do that. It’s just a very unfortunate thing,” he said.
At an event in Iowa on the same day, Trump reiterated that the shooting was "very unfortunate" but that, "I don't like that he had a gun." |
Cato Expert: Alex Pretti Shooting Raises Second Amendment Questions
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“Yet the law is not supposed to make Americans choose between their lives and their constitutional liberty. The Second Amendment gives people the right to bear arms, and the Fourth Amendment promises to stop the government from killing them for doing so.
Mr. Pretti’s death should be independently investigated. Courts should uphold strong limits on deadly force. And people should demand better of a government that voices their rights on Tuesday before insisting on Saturday that civilians can be killed for exercising them.” |
MN: Minneapolis Gun Owners Are Divided over Alex Pretti
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In the same VFW dining hall just north of Minneapolis, two gun owners are worlds apart on the topic of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse shot to death in a scuttle with border patrol agents on Saturday.
“I don’t understand why he had to have a weapon there that day,” said David Manley, an 85-year-old retired pipefitter and lifelong Republican, who said he owns five firearms.
Everything he knows about guns, Manley said, he learned from his father. Going to a protest with a loaded gun is not something his father ever would have advised. |
LJC Reminds the Court that Cannabis Use Is Not a License to Strip Second Amendment Rights
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The government should not categorically strip millions of Americans of their Second Amendment rights based solely on cannabis use, especially without any individualized finding that they are dangerous. The Liberty Justice Center is proud to file an amicus brief in United States v. Hemani, urging the U.S. Supreme Court to affirm the below decision.
The case concerns a federal statute that imposes a sweeping ban on firearm possession by “unlawful users” of controlled substances. In practice, the statute’s breadth reaches tens of millions of Americans who use cannabis—many of whom do so under state-law regimes that permit medical or adult recreational use. |
Disarming Millions of Americans Simply Because They Use Marijuana Is Unconstitutional, a SCOTUS Brief Says
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Judging from federal survey data, nearly a quarter of Americans 18 or older used marijuana in 2024, while 16 percent reported using it during the previous month. Those numbers suggest that somewhere between 43 million and 62 million Americans are disqualified from gun ownership because of their cannabis consumption, even if they live in one of the 40 states that have legalized marijuana for medical or recreational use. Marijuana users who nevertheless try to exercise the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms are committing up to four federal felonies. |
Shameless Gavin Newsom Pretends He's a Champion of Our Constitutional Rights
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Yesterday, President Trump raised more than a few eyebrows with his remarks about the Second Amendment and protests after the shooting of Leftist anti-ICE activist Alex Pretty in Minneapolis.
“Well, I haven’t heard that. But he shouldn’t have been carrying a gun…Bottom line, everybody in this room, we view that as a very unfortunate incident, okay? Everyone, unless you’re a stupid person. Very, very unfortunate, isn’t it,” the President said. “I don’t like that he had a gun, I don’t like that he had two fully loaded magazines. That’s a lot of bad stuff. And despite that, I say, that’s a, very unfortunate.”
We do have a right to carry a gun to a protest; we do not have a right to interfere with law enforcement, federal or otherwise. |
Tectonic Shift: Suddenly Left Supports 2A After Controversial Fatal Shooting
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In what can only be defined as a bizarre shift in attitude about guns, the Second Amendment and lawful concealed carry, the political left is taking a dramatically different look at the right to keep and bear arms, ignited by the deadly shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis and something the late Charlie Kirk wrote nearly eight years ago.
An editorialist might say the earth has shifted on its axis. |
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