According to Jenna Portnoy at the Washington Post, Governor McAuliffe intends to announce a deal with General Assembly Republicans to restore concealed weapons permit reciprocity arrangements with nearly all states. This reciprocity was endangered in December when Attorney General Mark Herring unilaterally ended reciprocity with 25 states.
The Governor’s announcement is expected tomorrow, and will lay out what was exchanged for the restoration. According to the Post, those concessions include:
If an individual’s Virginia concealed-carry permit is revoked, a permit from another state will not be honored in Virginia — a practice known as “state shopping.”
State police must be present at all gun shows to administer background checks in private sales of guns on a voluntary basis.
Anyone subject to a permanent protective order for a domestic violence offence will be prohibited from carrying a firearm for the two-year life of the order.
The policy changes will come in the form of bipartisan legislation before the General Assembly.
This seems like a good deal for gun owners, at least from the details currently available. Several Republican legislators had moved to fix the problem legislatively, but such efforts—even if they were passed by the General Assembly—seemed doomed fall under the weight of the Governor’s veto pen. So, a cautious preliminary kudos to leadership in the House and Senate for finding a way to get this done that involved only modest and sensible concessions.
Stay tuned for more developments.
15 comments
Individuals subject to a restraining order are already prohibited from possessing guns.
Sounds more like a howell deal for introducing broader back ground checks for private sellers.
This “deal” comes at a price. More than anything it is the principle of this deal. Republicans should never be making deals when there are alternatives such as legislation in the General Assembly that would do the same thing but made into law. This “deal” can always be taken back again by McAuliffe, but not the law. For example, Senator Black and Delegate Marshall have a budget amendment to return all reciprocity, and as it is part of the budget McAuliffe couldn’t line item veto it.
Also, taking something away just to give it back for “concessions” is just extortion. Now the Dems will be constantly doing the same thing to keep eating away at gun rights. It’s no different than BHO trading American hostages for money. What did the Iranians do the day they released the latest ones – went out and captured some more to extort more money.
I forgot to point out that 18 USC 922(g)(8) already restricts gun ownership rights vis a vis the domestic violence issue so the Republicans didn’t give away a lot there. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/922
I’ll wait and see for the final version of this.
I don’t trust McAuliffe. He is not the one that has the authority to make this deal. Where’s the assurance that once the new gun restrictions are in place, they will restore reciprocity?
McAuliffe lost to Creigh Deeds in ’09, because Deeds was perceived as being more pro-second amendment. McAuliffe therefore realizes that Herring is too far to the left on this issue for Virginia, and it would hurt his party.
Very good, Chad. The Left knows that if they grab too soon, too much, it will hurt them for a long time.
I’m supremely confused why McAuliffe decided to do this. He’s one of Hilary’s chief surrogates, a candidate who wants gun manufacturers liable for shooting deaths – why on EARTH would he overturn the work of the state AG that was so praised by gun-grabbers across the country.
We may be missing some salient facts that either have been left out or conveniently misplaced (wouldn’t be the first time) in the WP article. Otherwise they felt the AG didn’t hold a winning legal hand in his actions on appeal as becoming feint of heart at this late date is very out of character and not representative of our executive action fiat rule of law today. I agree totally argee with you that something doesn’t smell right although Obama is promising further executive actions so maybe they have an insider tip on something coming that we are completely unaware of currently.
I think this is pretty reasonable. But can you explain the first “concession” Steve, dealing with “state shopping?”
Let’s say I have a FL permit, and a VA permit. Then let’s say I commit a crime that, under Virginia law, results in me having my VA permit revoked. This new concession says that under such circumstances, Virginia’s reciprocity will not apply to my Florida permit…once I’ve had the Virginia permit revoked, it essentially revokes the effectiveness within Virginia of any others I might hold. (Note: it’s a common thing to hold multiple states’ permits, which is usually done to fill holes in your home state’s reciprocity arrangements).
Ah, now I see. Thanks, Steve.
If In fact those are the only two concessions it doesn’t seem like a bad deal.
Someone caved for this deal to happen. We’ll probably find out tomorrow who that is. Reading the comments on the WashPo article it appears everything thinks their team caved.