CCRKBA URGES NEBRASKA LAWMAKERS TO CLOSE THE ‘OMAHA LOOPHOLE’

BELLEVUE, WA – Passage of a concealed carry statute in Nebraska was a good first step toward insuring the safety of Cornhusker State citizens, but the new law has a gaping loophole that apparently allows cities like Omaha to continue denying their residents the right of personal protection.

The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) is encouraging residents of Omaha, Lincoln and other communities to start contacting their city councils, demanding that they reject any attempt to prohibit concealed carry as the City of Omaha is apparently planning to do, based on a 70-year-old ordinance.

“A report in the Lincoln Journal Star newspaper pretty much said it all,” noted CCRKBA Executive Director Joe Waldron. “Anti-public safety lawmakers in Omaha are against the new law, and are defending a local ordinance that bans concealed firearms, even when the majority of Omaha legislators voted for it.

“It must be okay with city officials that criminals have illegally carried concealed guns for many years,” Waldron added, “but they evidently just can’t stand the idea that honest citizens might be able to fight back under a new law, and this in a city where the murder rate is twice that for the rest of the state.”

The Journal Star report said that “A loophole in the (state) law now makes the positions of city council members and mayors across the state most important. It appears that the law will allow cities to override the law and ban conceal (sic) carry. Look for Lincoln to try and take advantage of the loophole. Omaha already has a law on the books prohibiting concealed weapons.” There is disagreement whether the state law will allow communities to adopt new ordinances banning concealed carry, or just honor Omaha’s 1936 ban, or preempt such laws altogether.

“Time and time again we hear anti-gun extremists howl about mythical ‘gun show loopholes’ when they attack perfectly legal firearms exhibitions,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan M. Gottlieb. “But now comes a genuine legal ‘loophole,’ identified by a Nebraska newspaper, that defies public safety, the will of the legislature and common sense, and the press is tickled pink, and so are the anti-gun politicians who plan to take advantage of that loophole. Their hypocrisy and social bigotry against law-abiding armed citizens appears to have no maximum depth to which it can sink.”