SAF Announces Merger Of Jews For The Preservation Of Firearms Ownership
The Second Amendment Foundation today announced that Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO) has become part of the SAF family, bringing together two stalwart gun rights organizations under one banner.
“We’re both delighted and proud to announce this merger,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “JPFO was founded 25 years ago by the late Aaron Zelman, and it has become a strong voice in defense of the Second Amendment. I’m personally confident that bringing JPFO into the SAF extended family will benefit firearms owners at many levels.”
Zelman passed away in 2010, and for the past four years, the JPFO has worked hard to maintain its position in the gun rights community.
“We see this as a tremendous opportunity,” said Gottlieb. “With SAF’s resources, we expect JPFO to continue its important work and grow to meet new challenges, educating people about the pitfalls of gun control, and the benefits of gun ownership and personal protection.”
Gottlieb said JPFO operations will be transferred from Wisconsin, where it was founded by Zelman in 1989, to the SAF offices at Liberty Park in Bellevue, Wash. JPFO editorial support staff will stay on and help maintain Continue reading
JPFO Joins Second Amendment Foundation
Open Letter Details Merger Between the Two Pro-Gun Organizations
Dear JPFO Members and Supporters,
Even before the passing of founder, Aaron Zelman, there was serious doubt as to whether or not JPFO could survive. For years Aaron struggled heroically with chronic health problems.
The results were rapidly expanding problems in administrative, database and member support and new product operations, along with no systematic fundraising program — to name just a few. Aaron delegated painfully little… But considering it all, what he accomplished goes well beyond the heroic to near miracles.
The regular staff was reduced to a devoted office manager of some 15-years, LaVonne, an equally devoted webmaster, Chris and Aaron’s two Board members, Bruce and Bob serving with him since the mid-1990s. The effort to rebuild JPFO began in earnest, facing the ominous headwinds of a diminished database and largely empty coffers.
After some months, Charles Heller stepped-in to provide Executive Director services; including media contacts.
One bright spot was the wise counsel of the JPFO advisor on spiritual matters, Rabbi Dovid Bendory, known affectionately as the “Gun Rabbi.” Continue reading
22 State Attorneys General Join Pro-Second Amendment Brief in SAFE Act Appeal
Amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) briefs have been filed in Nojay v. Cuomo, the appeal from the decision of Judge William Skretny last year that largely upheld New York’s Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (“SAFE”) Act. The plaintiffs challenged bans on large-capacity magazines and “assault weapons” (as redefined), the requirement that magazines contain no more than seven rounds, and new rules on ammunition sales, as unconstitutional. After Judge Skretnty denied most of these claims, the case (decided as New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, Inc. v. Cuomo) was appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Attorneys General for 22 states – Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming – have filed an amicus brief in support of the plaintiffs.
In contrast, the chief legal officers for only nine states (plus D.C.) – Maryland, California, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, and Oregon – have opted to support the SAFE Act through their own amicus filing. Predictably, many of these Continue reading
Pinch Yourself… Firearm Carry in DC?
UPDATE (7/29/2014) Motion to stay decision pending appeal granted. While this is in place, you cannot legally carry in DC.
If you follow GunLink on social media like Twitter or Facebook, peruse the GunLink forums or listen to the “gun buzz,” you may have already heard the big news coming out of DC. Over this past weekend, a major decision and order was handed down from the US District Court in the District of Columbia in Palmer et al. vs DC.
In case you haven’t been paying, this is the case where plaintiffs Palmer, Lyon, Raymond, McVey and the Second Amendment Foundation claim that “[b]y requiring a permit to carry a handgun in public, yet refusing to issue such permits and refusing to allow the possession of any handgun that would be carried in public, Defendants [the District of Columbia] maintain a complete ban on the carrying of handguns in public by almost all individuals” and that “banning the carrying of handguns in public violate[s] the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution, facially and as applied against the individual plaintiffs in this action, damaging plaintiffs in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983.”
In a landmark win for rights in our nation’s capital, after the District Court heard arguments from Alan Gura – whose name you probably remember from such notable cases as McDonald V Chicago, DC v Heller, Moore v Madigan and others – Senior US District Court Judge Frederick Scullin Jr handed down his opinion (full text of opinion): Continue reading
But It’s Just a Policy…
Why “Concealed Means Concealed” is a Bunch of Hooey
Since there have been firearms to carry there have been businesses, individuals and organizations that want to restrict firearms carry. This isn’t anything new. However, there has been a recent rash of well-publicized statements from companies like Target, IKEA, Starbucks, Chili’s, Chipotle and others who say that they would prefer to have a “criminal protection zone” than an environment in which their customers are able to #EatSafe and #ShopSafe.
These statements are often met with replies along the lines of “concealed means concealed” or “if you do it right, they will never know that you are carrying.”
It is most likely true that you could carry a concealed firearms into any of these places without anyone ever being wise to it. After all, have you ever seen metal detectors or pat-downs in any of the aforementioned businesses. In many of these cases, you would probably be within the law unless you were asked to leave and refused to do so.
The question is… why on earth would you want to? Continue reading
Tell Businesses Not to Disarm Customers
Project #EatSafe and Project #ShopSafe: Using Social Media to Urge Businesses to Exercise Real Common Sense
Despite being irrational, fear mongering, hoplophobic bigots, gun control zealots do get one thing right: PR campaigns. They simply do not have the facts on their side, so they try to use emotions to garner support for their misguided ideology and, often, they succeed. Between desperate hand-wringing, fabricated “facts,” and effective use of astroturf social media movements, the vocal minority of the anti-constitution crowd knows how to get what they want (or at least give the impression that they did).
Take, for instance, recent social media campaigns to bully, er… boycott, businesses that weren’t taking an anti-gun position. The #BurritosNotBullets hashtag campaign enlisted social media users to harass Chipotle until they asked customers not to bring firearms into their restaurants. Before that, anti-rights groups and their supporters organized #SkipStarbucks Saturday (it must have been oh-so-difficult for morning commuters and 9-to-5-ers to give up the coffee shop on the weekend) before Starbucks reversed their firearms policy. Whether the online campaigns had anything to do with the decisions or the companies simply made a business decision based on the action of a few demonstrators, the gun control groups immediately began crowing loudly and taking credit for each “victory.” Continue reading
