BELLEVUE, WA – Almost as if on cue, anti-gun Chicago Mayor Richard Daley has danced in the blood of slain Northern Illinois University students to push his gun control agenda, yet none of the things on his wish list would have prevented the tragedy at DeKalb, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.
“Mayor Daley has virtually the same agenda he’s been pandering for years,†said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “He wants to ban .50-caliber target rifles and semiautomatic sport utility rifles. He wants to punish people who sell firearms to friends and relatives; he wants microstamping and trigger locks, and limit handgun purchases to one per month. These measures have nothing remotely to do with last week’s shooting in a gun-free college zone, and he knows it.
“Even State Sen. John Cullerton from Chicago admitted that none of these proposals would have stopped Steven Kazmierczak from carrying out his attack,†Gottlieb continued. “In the middle of this soap opera, Mayor Daley assumes this noble pose by insisting that ‘You don’t want a tragedy to give you momentum.’ He’s a liar. Of course he wants this tragedy to give momentum to his extremist anti-gun rights agenda. That’s why he mentioned it.
“Daley knows that .50-caliber target rifles aren’t used in crimes,†Gottlieb said. “He knows there was no private sale involved in Kazmierczak’s gun acquisitions. He knows trigger lock mandates would not have prevented the DeKalb shooting. He knows the killer didn’t have a rifle. He knows that requiring microstamping in pistols would not have stopped Kazmierczak’s use of a shotgun in that lecture hall. He knows the killer had a valid Firearm Owner’s ID card and that he passed background checks.
“What Mayor Daley doesn’t seem to understand is that lawmakers outside his sphere of influence are wising up to his rhetoric, and so are voters,†Gottlieb stated. “Daley thinks the DeKalb shooting, and other recent attacks, are an ‘epidemic’ of violence. The only real epidemic at work here is one of stupidity, where people think restrictive gun laws coupled with gun free school zones, where everyone is defenseless, keep them safe.
“The time has come for a new strategy,†he concluded. “Americans want change, and they want it now. Lawmakers should pass a progressive concealed carry law in Illinois, with sensible provisions that allow legally-licensed students and teachers to carry on university campuses. Mayor Daley’s way is the old way, and it has given us nothing but grief and homicide victims.â€