“It is legal to openly carry a gun on Utah’s public university and college campuses with very few exceptions,” the Salt Lake Tribune reports.
“It’s unknown if the shooter who fatally fired on conservative commentator Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University in Orem on Wednesday afternoon was openly carrying or had a concealed weapon, but both are technically allowed.”
“In the wake of the Minneapolis Catholic church shooting, senior Justice Department officials are weighing proposals to limit transgender people’s right to possess firearms,” CNN reports.
“Such a move would represent a dramatic escalation of the Trump administration’s fight against the rights of transgender Americans.”
Fox News host and former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) questioned stricter gun control legislation when he was in office and took money from the National Rifle Association, the HuffPost reports.
But live on air, in the wake of the deadly shooting in Minnesota, he appeared to have a change of heart: “We’re going to have a conversation of freedom versus protecting children… We’ve got to decide whether or not we want to live like this.”
“Washington DC’s top federal prosecutor says that her office will pursue the toughest criminal charges for arrests made in the Trump administration’s purported crime crackdown, even as the office softens enforcement of a DC law that makes it illegal to possess rifles and shotguns in the city,” CNN reports.
“The Trump administration has terminated more than half of all federal funding for gun violence prevention programs in the U.S., cutting $158 million in grants that had been directed to groups in cities like New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, DC, and Baltimore,” Reuters reports.
“The Justice Department plans to slash the number of inspectors who monitor federally licensed gun dealers by two-thirds, sharply limiting the government’s already crimped capacity to identify businesses that sell guns to criminals,“ the New York Times reports.
“The move, part of the Trump administration’s effort to defang and downsize the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, comes as the department considers merging the A.T.F. and the Drug Enforcement Administration. It follows a rollback of Biden-era regulations aimed at stemming the spread of deadly homemade firearms, along with other gun control measures.”
“The Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously blocked the Mexican government from proceeding with an unusual lawsuit that sought to hold major U.S. firearms manufacturers accountable for gun violence in that country,” the Washington Post reports.
“The justices reversed an appeals court ruling, saying Mexico had failed to show a close enough connection between guns made in the United States and drug cartel violence.”
“The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it would not hear a major Second Amendment challenge to a Maryland law banning semiautomatic rifles like the AR-15. As is the court’s practice, its brief order gave no reasons,” the New York Times reports.
“The move, over the objections of three conservative justices, let the ban stand and reflected the court’s intermittent engagement with gun rights.”
The Hill: “But Justice Brett Kavanaugh sent a strong signal that he will provide that crucial fourth vote in a future case once the issue percolates more in the lower courts.”
Los Angeles Times: Supreme Court turns away a 2nd Amendment challenge to blue-state bans on assault weapons.
Time: “Like a lot of Democrats these days, Chris Murphy has been doing some soul searching. For years, the Connecticut Senator, who took office shortly after the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, was one of the nation’s most outspoken advocates for tighter gun laws. Gun safety was so important, he argued, that supporting an assault-weapons ban should be mandatory for Democratic leaders.”
“Recently, Murphy has come to believe he was wrong. Not about tougher gun laws, but about trying to force all Democrats to adopt his position.”
Said Murphy: “I bear some responsibility for where we are today. I spent a long time trying to make the issue of guns a litmus test for the Democratic Party. I think that all of the interest groups that ended up trying to apply a litmus test for their issue ended up making our coalition a lot smaller.”
The Trump administration has decided to permit the sale of devices that enable standard firearms to fire like machine guns, a move that one person familiar with the matter said was “by far the most dangerous thing this administration has done” on gun policy, NBC News reports.
“The Trump administration has removed a memorial honoring victims of gun violence from the main atrium of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, taking down about 120 portraits hung during the Biden administration,” the Washington Post reports.
“The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld the Biden administration’s regulation of ghost guns, the largely untraceable firearms that had been used in a growing number of crimes over the last decade and alarmed law enforcement agencies,” the Washington Post reports.
“In a 7-2 ruling, the justices allowed 2022 rules by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that require serial numbers, sales receipts and background checks for the weapons, which are typically purchased in kits online and assembled at home.”
“The decision could be considered a departure for the Supreme Court’s conservative majority, which has been skeptical of gun regulation in recent terms.”
“A slew of conservative politicians and gun activists, including Donald Trump Jr., and investor Blake Masters, are joining the board of GrabAGun, a digital firearms retailer that plans to go public this summer,” Axios reports.
New York Times: “Influencers known as guntubers are delving into the world of firearms, showing viewers everything from how to shoot to how to modify an AR-15.”
“This year was the most active for gunfire on school grounds since 2013, when Everytown for Gun Safety started tracking data,” Axios reports.
Jill Filipovic: “If everyone is a sexual predator, then no one’s history of misdeeds matters (or, at least, no one needs to be held accountable).”
“MAGA Republicans seem to be having their own #MeToo moment, except here, a growing cohort of men is essentially saying: Oh, another man accused of sexual predation? #MeToo—and so what? Being accused of sexual harassment, abuse, or assault is no longer disqualifying; on the right, it has been normalized. It may even be an asset.”
Washington Post: “The report, published Wednesday by the Commonwealth Fund, an independent research group, found that the overall rate of firearms deaths in Mississippi was nearly twice that of Haiti, an impoverished Caribbean nation where violent gangs control large swaths of the country and whose president was assassinated by gunmen in 2021.”
“Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama also had higher firearms death rates than Mexico, where rival drug cartels are engaged in bloody conflict. Montana’s death rate from guns was higher than in Colombia, where drug trafficking is rife. Wyoming, Arizona and Oklahoma all ranked above Brazil. Suburban New Jersey had a higher gun death rate than Nicaragua, Mali and Djibouti.”
“The Supreme Court on Tuesday overturned a lower court ruling from Pennsylvania that allowed residents under 21 to carry firearms in public, though the justices declined for now to hear arguments in the case themselves,” CNN reports.
“At issue was a state law that barred 18-to-20 years olds from open carrying firearms during declared states of emergencies. The court’s decision tosses a federal appeals court ruling that found the law violated the Second Amendment.”
“The Supreme Court did not explain its ruling and no dissents were noted.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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