Earlier this week on Tuesday, as many as 14 Republicans chose to side with Democrats in the Senate to advance the gun control bill.
This is a bill the National Rifle Association has been very adamant in opposing, clearing the initial hurdle that was the 64-34 vote.
Despite being sold out by more than a dozen members of the party that was their greatest supporter, the NRA stood its ground.
The gun rights organization said it’ll continue to oppose the bill. It does next to nothing when it comes to actually addressing violent criminals, while also challenging the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans.
Playing both sides of the field
The legislation could easily make legal gun purchases much more difficult. This doesn’t exactly impact criminal behavior, considering a majority of violent crimes are committed with illegally owned firearms.
However, the 14 Republicans didn’t seem to understand how damaging the bill was. They left far too much power in government officials’ hands and used federal dollars to fund absurd gun control measures.
Republicans betrayed your gun rights once again in closed-door negotiations.
While the NRA looks the other way and continues to endorse them, we will nullify their schemes, abolish the ATF, end all red flag laws, encourage 3D gun printing, and decriminalize automatic weapons.
— Libertarian Party (@LPNational) June 22, 2022
The list of these turncoats goes as follows: Sens. John Cornyn, Mitch McConnell, Lisa Murkowski, and Todd Young.
Additional Republicans who backed gun control include Sens. Joni Ernst Bill Cassidy, Susan Collins, Roy Blunt, Thom Tillis, and Richard Burr.
They were joined by remaining Sens. Rob Portman, Lindsey Graham, Mitt Romney, and Shelley Moore Capito.
Cornyn tried to clear his name by claiming a compromise was needed. This prompted him to lead the other 13 senators into supporting this highly questionable bill that will go above and beyond to endanger lawful gun owners.
A clear violation of Second Amendment rights
In fact, Cornyn is fully convinced the legislation is going to bring about positive change and protect our nation’s youth and communities.
It’s almost as if gun education and giving the police enough funding to fight these violent criminals wouldn’t have done the trick.
When was the last time 14 Democrats crossed the aisle to vote with Republicans on anything?
— Rising serpent 🇺🇸 (@rising_serpent) June 22, 2022
McConnell weighed in on the matter as well, calling the bill a “package of common sense“ that will undoubtedly decrease shootings in the US, while also upholding Americans’ Second Amendment rights.
While he’s technically correct about the first part, McConnell is dead wrong for believing the bill wouldn’t violate the Second Amendment; it wouldn’t have been met with such pushback from the NRA, if that were the case.
14 Democrats would never join Republicans for any reason.
It simply wouldn't happen.
The @SenateGOP isn't just useless. It's Dem controlled opposition.
— John Cardillo (@johncardillo) June 22, 2022
Unfortunately, it also means much stricter background checks for anyone between the ages of 18 and 21 looking to purchase a firearm, completely isolating the demographic from easy access to personal protection.
The two Republicans who chose not to vote on the bill were Sens. Kevin Cramer and Pat Toomey. However, simply not voting is just as bad as supporting the Democrats’ cause for gun control.