In his State of the Union address, which many critics are now saying was just one long campaign speech, President Joe Biden revived his demand that Congress ban so-called “assault weapons” and “high-capacity magazines.”
The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms was quick to react, stating in a press release, “President Joe Biden declared his vision for the future to ‘restore the right to choose and protect other freedoms, not take them away,’ but that obviously doesn’t include choosing to own firearms, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms stated in response.”
The full address was broadcast by C-SPAN. CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb was watching.
“He claimed that his lifetime has taught him to embrace freedom and democracy, but that obviously doesn’t include the freedom to keep and bear arms,” Gottlieb said. “He boasted about creating an office of ‘gun violence prevention,’ which translates to the first-ever White House office of gun control and citizen disarmament. It’s a thinly-disguised mini-bureaucracy whose only possible function is to lobby for more restrictive gun laws.”
Biden’s brief remarks came about two-thirds of the way through his speech, which last 1 hour and 7 minutes, and included multiple references to the policies of former President Donald only as his “predecessor.” Biden’s distaste for Trump’s policies—which have once again propelled the former president to his likely nomination to regain the Oval office in November—became obvious within minutes of beginning his speech. According to Fox News, several former presidential speech writers offered mixed reviews of the speech, depending upon their political lean. Democrat speech writers thought Biden came on strong and scored points, while Republican speech writers ripped the president for the overtly partisan tone, with one calling it an “utter disgrace.”
However, the New York Times analysis portrayed Biden’s address as well done, and CNN called it a “forceful speech with frequent ad-libs.”
Liberal Biden is also being criticized by Democrats for using the term “illegal” during his remarks about Laken Riley, the young woman murdered by an “undocumented” migrant from Venezuela, in Atlanta, Ga., late last month. The Huffington Post is reporting how several Democrats said Biden should have used the term “undocumented.”
Social media postings Thursday night and Friday show gun owners were hardly receptive to the president’s remarks. At one Facebook thread, one man remarked, “I’m seeing how stupid he is and how bad it’s going be if he’s reelected.” Another predicted a second Biden term will feature gun bans.
“Biden claims that banning guns doesn’t violate the Second Amendment or vilify responsible gun owners,” CCRKBA’s Gottlieb said. “The hell it doesn’t. Millions of honest American men and women of all races and political backgrounds have already embraced the freedom to choose what constitutionally-protected firearms they want to responsibly own, and along comes Biden with a demand that those arms be banned.
“This president vilifies gun owners every time he demands new restrictions on Second Amendment rights because he’s literally telling a hundred-million citizens he doesn’t trust them,” Gottlieb observed. “He claimed his lifetime has taught him to respect everyone, but he obviously doesn’t mean America’s gun owners, because his entire political career has focused on disrespecting their rights, banning the guns they own and diminishing their freedom.
“President Biden has a history of telling whoppers,” the gun rights advocate stated, “and his State of the Union campaign speech certainly held to that tradition where gun rights are concerned. He may have fooled Democrats in Congress and his media cheerleaders, but he didn’t fool American gun owners.”
But Biden trotted out an oft-used reference to his battles with the NRA.
“I’m proud we beat the NRA when I signed the most significant gun safety law in nearly 30 years,” Biden declared. “Now we must beat the NRA again! I’m demanding a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines!”
Biden seemed to literally shout these words, while Republicans in the chamber remained silent.
The president has exhibited an open animosity for the National Rifle Association throughout his half-century on Capitol Hill. First elected to the U.S. Senate in 1972, he took office in January 1973. He has often boasted about “defeating” the NRA on gun control, particularly his effort to pass the Brady Law and the 10-year semi-auto ban that was part of the Clinton Crime Bill of 1994, the passage of which cost more than 50 Democrats their seats in Congress.
