“…one group stands out for its sheer, undisguised brazenness.”
This is what the liberal columnist Rekha Basu, from the Des Moines Register, had to say about Iowa Gun Owners and your efforts to protect and defend your 2nd Amendment rights over the last few days.
You see, it was a long week at the Capitol for the anti-gun Representative Clel Baudler.
Hundreds and hundreds of you have called the Capitol urging House Speaker Kraig Paulsen to do his job as the leader of the House and either make House Public Safety Committee Chairman Baudler honor the 2nd Amendment by advancing the Constitutional Carry bill (HF2113) or replace him with someone who will.
Chairman Baudler and I debated the 2nd Amendment on the WHO Radio show where he flat out admitted that he disagrees with Constitutional Carry. He disagrees that you have the right to carry a gun for self-defense – unless you have undergone government mandated training, pay a fee for that class, then apply for the permit, wait a few days, then pay another fee for the permit, (in some counties you’ll need to submit to a photograph and fingerprint scan), and then have your name added into a government database.
This certainly isn’t in my copy of the Constitution. This surely isn’t in Chairman Baudler’s own party platform either.
But the pressure on Chairman Baudler didn’t let up.
Many of you have gone to the Capitol to speak personally with Representative Baudler about this only to be cursed out. If he says that to you, imagine what he says to representatives from Iowa Gun Owners!
Then, after watching Chairman Baudler firsthand, several Republican Senators and one Republican Representative decided they had had enough and penned an open letter to Speaker Paulsen urging him to do his part to ensure that Constitutional Carry was passed out of the House committee.
Now, when the pressure gets hot, Republican Chairman Baudler receives help from what should be an unusual source: the Des Moines Register. The paper did an editorial last Friday that praised Baudler for his refusal to advance Constitutional Carry.
How nice is that. One of the most liberal papers in the state coming to the aid of Rep. Baudler, who is a Republican! It sounds like Baudler is in the wrong party if he’s getting praised by the Des Moines Register.
From a purely strategic standpoint, Republicans as a whole need to seriously consider why they are allowing their party to team up with liberal interests as opposed to keeping their campaign promises to 2nd Amendment voters.
There are more than a few Republicans who won their seat in the House last election cycle by the tiniest of margins, thanks in part to gun owners.
Take Representative Bob Hager from NE Iowa as an example. Hager won his election by just 16 votes, in part because Iowa Gun Owners informed THOUSANDS of gun owners in his district that he completed our Gun Owners Candidate Survey with 100 percent pro-gun responses.
Hager, who was reportedly fishing in Canada for several weeks prior to election day since he apparently was expecting to lose his election, squeaked out a 16 vote election night victory thanks in part to gun owners.
In 2011, Hager broke his promise to gun owners in his district when he voted against Constitutional Carry on the Floor of the Iowa House. As it stands now, Iowa Gun Owners will be forced to tell our members in that district where Hager stands on the issue as evidenced by his voting history.
This may not end well for Rep. Hager, which is not our concern since all that our members have empowered us to do is advocate for the 2nd Amendment, not a political party. Hager NEEDS the chance to vote on Constitutional Carry. Yet he’s being denied that opportunity because of Chairman Baudler and Speaker Paulsen.
Some of you may be wondering if Constitutional Carry is dead now since the first legislative deadline has come and gone.
Not at all.
Constitutional Carry will be coming up for a vote, one way or the other. Either the Republican controlled House will keep their promises to move the bill on their own, or any number of committed pro-gun legislators will use procedural moves in the House to FORCE the bill onto the Floor for a vote.
This way, you and I will know as we roll into the next election cycle who is truly pro-gun and who is not. We can not allow the politicians to block a vote, or else you’ll never know where they stand on your gun rights!
Here’s what you can do to help:
- Take a moment to email your State Representative and explain to him that you voted for him or her because they promised to advance Constitutional Carry and the 2nd Amendment in general (assuming that they did so), in their 2010 campaigns. Tell them that since the House leadership refuses to move Constitutional Carry out of the House on their own that you understand that a forced vote will be occurring. Insist that they support that vote and remind them that is the vote you’ll be using to decide whether or not they kept their campaign promise. You can find your legislator’s email address by going to this website. (Please note that the state’s website is being redone and so you may be routed to other places to find your legislator. This is out of our control.)
- Also, we are only as effective as our members are at applying the pressure to the politicians. Please make sure and involve ALL of your pro-gun friends and family here in Iowa. Use our Forward-to-a-Friend feature beneath this email to make sure they are getting the most up to date information!
- Our efforts are not funded by taxpayers like the Attorney General’s lobbyists are. We don’t have the ability to take taxpayer funded uniformed police officers off the street and into the Capitol to lobby against gun bills like the Iowa State Sheriff’s and Deputies Association does. Nor can we count on favors from the liberal editorial writers at the Des Moines Register. Every email we send (yes, it costs money when you send as many emails as we do), every piece of direct mail we are forced to send out to mobilize voters on a particular bill, everything we do is funded exclusively by the generous support of grassroots Iowans.
This is a time of year when Iowa Gun Owners is required to spend a lot of resources trying to advance good gun bills and stop anti-gun actions caused by politicians like Rep. Baudler. Please consider an emergency contribution to our efforts. As the Des Moines Register made clear – NO ONE else in Iowa fights as hard as we do for your gun rights. Your contribution of $50, $35 or even just $10 will go a long way to enable our critical programs.
Thank you for your activism!
For Freedom,
Aaron Dorr
Executive Director
P.S. Thanks to your calls, emails, and trips to the Capitol to lobby for your 2nd Amendment freedoms, the politicians are feeling the heat to the point that they are turning to the hyper liberal Des Moines Register’s editorial board for help!
We can’t let up. If the politicians in Des Moines are going to refuse to vote on Constitutional Carry then you and I need to make sure that pro-gun legislators FORCE a vote so that you and I all know who’s pro-gun and who’s not as we approach the next election cycle. Please email your Representative today and tell them how you expect them to vote on this critical piece of legislation when it comes up for a vote.
Please also do what you can to help fund our critical efforts. Clearly no one fights harder to defend your 2nd Amendment rights here in Iowa evidenced by the recent editorial piece published in the Des Moines Register. We don’t use taxpayer money like the anti-gunners do to lobby. Every penny we spend must come from you, our generous supporters.