Anti-gun New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who personally shied away from making is own bid for the Democrat Party’s presidential nomination, is now attempting to dictate terms to candidates who are chancing a run on the subject of gun control.
Over the weekend, according to Spectrum News, the third-term governor inserted himself into the campaign to unseat Donald Trump by declaring that Democrat presidential candidates who do not embrace his four-point gun control scheme should not be running for the nation’s highest office.
Spectrum News reported Cuomo’s “renewed national effort to urge the Democratic presidential candidates” to jump aboard his so-called “Make America Safer” campaign. He claims national gun control is possible because it worked in New York, according to WIVB News.
“We can do it, and New York is a laboratory test case,” the three-term Democrat acknowledged. “Don’t tell me we can’t do it because we did it in the state of New York. Also, that big part called Upstate New York, they’re as vehement about the Second Amendment as anyone. But we passed it and it saved lives and it didn’t infringe on anyone’s rights.”
So what’s this plan? As detailed by the Hudson Valley Post, Cuomo’s national gun control proposal’s four tenets are:
- Outlaw assault weapons and high-capacity magazines
- Create a mental health database to prevent the dangerously mentally ill from purchasing a firearm
- Pass universal background checks closing the private gun sales loophole
- Pass Red Flag legislation preventing individuals who pose a risk to themselves or others from purchasing a firearm
This proposal isn’t much different from positions already taken by various candidates, and is less extreme than Beto O’Rourke’s “compensated confiscation” approach, so is Cuomo merely trying to be relevant to a campaign process in which he personally is taking no active part?
“New York state passed these laws six years ago and they have worked,” Cuomo stated, according to Spectrum News. “No legal gun owners’ rights have been violated, but unnecessary, dangerous weapons are off the streets and dangerously mentally ill people cannot buy guns. We were the laboratory, and now it must be done on the national level. And if a candidate can’t support this pledge, I don’t believe they should be running for president as a Democrat.”
Cuomo might get some argument from gun owners over whether his gun control effort has violated their rights.
The 2013 Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (SAFE) Act has been challenged in court, but judges have upheld the law. That doesn’t mean gun owners like it or accept it.
