frontlines

Long Island, NY —  Three hospitals in Long Island are going to start collecting data on gun ownership from every single patient who comes in the door — regardless of their reason for being there.

[This could be bad news for gun owners in "Red Flag" states, like NY.]

Northwell Health system says they are going to “analyze the risks of gun ownership” by collecting the data in a $1.4 million dollar program they’re calling “We Ask Everyone About Guns.”

Catchy name.

Their public statement on the data collection explains that the hospital system plans to expand the study to all of their hospitals, but are starting with just three.  Additionally, they liken the problem of ‘gun violence’ to a disease — thereby invoking funding for their research. [emphasis added]

The New Hyde Park-based health system said the grant is part of its “We Ask Everyone About Guns” research study, which approaches firearm injury risk similarly to other health risk factors that are part of routine care, like smoking, substance use and motor vehicle accidents.

“Gun violence is a public health issue,” said Michael J. Dowling, the president and chief executive at Northwell Health. “This is the health industry’s responsibility to talk about this and do something about it.”

This isn’t Northwell’s first foray into the gun control debate — or their first attempt to claim that gun violence is a disease.  In 2019, the Hospital system posted the following statements on their blog:

“Guns don’t kill people; people kill people,” is a scientifically inaccurate statement, says Hargarten. Guns do not, in fact, kill people, but the bullets certainly do. “The kinetic energy from the bullet is the ‘agent,’ much like the HIV virus is the agent that causes AIDS,” he explains. “The bullet and the kinetic energy it transmits to the body tears and destroy cells and tissue, damages organs, breaks bones and leads to disability or death.”

The disease model, Hargarten says, is how researchers and public health and medical professionals studied and addressed the staggering numbers of motor vehicle injuries and fatalities. “We scientifically investigated crashes and motor vehicle fatalities and learned that attenuating the kinetic energy release reduced injuries and death.” In other words, driving at slower speeds, requiring seatbelts and car seats, adding airbags, even redesigning on-ramps and road curves, contributed to a steep reduction in motor vehicle fatalities since the 1970s. With guns, Hargarten says, maybe interventions can include limiting the rate at which a gun can release bullets. Or limiting how many bullets it can release—aka restricting access to automatic weapons, “bump stocks,” and high-capacity magazines.

Back in 2019, the government granted the CDC a $25 million dollar budget to research the ‘gun violence’ epidemic.  We pointed out at that time how ludicrous it is to liken gun violence to a disease.  Bullets aren’t contagious, and there’s no genetic component or nutritional solution! You can’t kill a germ and make it go away.

But here we are, using tax-payer dollars to purchase science that backs up the anti-gun agenda.  This isn’t science.  It’s a politically motivated agenda that’s being advanced by our own tax dollars. [emphasis added]

New York State Has Red Flag Laws

Gun owners will remember that New York has already passed and implemented Red Flag Laws.  That means that if  a gun owner answers the questions their doctor is asking them truthfully –“Yes, I have guns in my home” and then expresses anger at the driver that just hit their car –sending them to the ER in the first place — they could get Red Flagged by their doctor that same day.

If you go to the ER for pneumonia and the doctor finds out you have guns as well as a prescription for an anti-depressant, they can Red Flag you as mentally unstable.  If you are upset about the insane bill that you’ve gotten from the same hospital and call to complain to the billing department…..they’ll see on your chart that you are a gun owner and can have you Red Flagged for being angry on the phone.

The hospital isn’t bothering to look into why the state’s current gun control — which is some of the worst in the country — isn’t stopping violent crime.   No, they’re going to pin this on law abiding gun owners and will manipulate the data to fit their agenda.

This anti-gun agenda is out of control and these Red Flag laws are unconstitutional in the extreme. This is a dangerous combination for gun owners in New York.

S.C.O.P.E.'s Candidates’ Ratings on the 2nd Amendment

Neither the Constitution nor the Supreme Court has stopped the never-ending attacks by those that would disarm our citizens and whittle away at the Constitution.  It is imperative that we have political office holders who will preserve, protect and defend the entire Constitution, including the Second Amendment.  Toward that end, SCOPE has rated the following candidates as an “A” and believe they will work to preserve, protect and defend our right to keep and bear arms, as enshrined in our Constitution. 

For the United States Congress from New York State:

District 1       Lee Zeldin

District 3       George Devolder-Santos

District 14     John Cummings

District 18     Chele Farley

District 19     Kyle Van De Water

District 20     Liz Joy

District 21     Elise Stefanik

District 22     Claudia Tenney

District 23     Tom Reed    

District 24     John Katko

District 26     Ricky Donovan Sr

District 27     Chris Jacobs            

  Listed below is any New York State Senate candidate that got an A rating from at least one of either SCOPE, New York State Rifle and Pistol Association (NYSRPA) or NRA-PVF (NRA).    

District 1       Anthony Palumbo              SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-B

District 2       Mario Mattera                    SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 3       Alexis Weik                          SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 4       Philip Boyle                          SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-C

District 5       Edmund Smythe                 SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 6       Dennis Dunne                     SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 7       David Franklin                     SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 9       Victoria Johnson                 SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-B

District 15     Thomas Sullivan                 SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-?     NRA-A

District 22     Vito Bruno                            SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 23     Justin DeFillippo                 SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-?     NRA-?

District 24     Andrew Lanza                     SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-C

District 30     Oz Sultan                              SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-?     NRA-A

District 37     Liviu Saimovici                    SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 39     Steve Brescia                       SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 40     Rob Astorino                       SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 41     Susan Serino                        SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 42     Mike Martucci                     SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 43     Daphne Jordan                    SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 45     Dan Stec                               SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 46     Richard Amedure               SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 47     Joseph Grippo                     SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 48     Patricia Ritchie                    SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 49     James Tedisco                     SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 50     Angi Renna                           SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 51     Peter Oberacker                 SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 52     Fred Ashkar                          SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 53     Sam Rogers                          SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-?

District 54     Pamela Helming                 SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 55     Christopher Missick           SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 56     Michael Barry                      SCOPE-?        NYSRPA-A     NRA-A           

District 57     George Borrello                  SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 58     Thomas O’Mara                 SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A           

District 59     Patrick Gallivan                   SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A           

District 60     Joshua Mertzlufft               SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 61     Edward Rath                        SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

District 62     Rob Ortt                                SCOPE-A       NYSRPA-A     NRA-A

Click here to download a Pdf copy of this ratings list.

The Founders Wanted You to Own an AR-15 by David Harsanyi, National Review

In his questioning of Amy Coney Barrett regarding an Indiana case about a non-violent felon and his constitutional right to bear arms, Illinois senator Dick Durbin dropped numerous false claims about Chicago gun crimes. But he topped it all off with one of the most egregiously inane arguments used against the private ownership of guns:

Durbin went on to say that the logical conclusion of the “originalist” position on firearms should be that the Founders were referring to flintlock muskets rather than modern “military weapons.” (A purposefully misleading labelling of semi-automatic rifles that Democrats are trying to ban.)

Originalism, of course, isn’t the same as literalism. Even it were, Durbin would be wrong. Because the right to self-defense isn’t predicated on any one specific weapon but a principle. Which is why the Second Amendment doesn’t guarantee the right of individuals to “keep and bear Kentucky rifles” any more than the First Amendment guarantees the right of individuals to “write on parchment paper” or to worship “in Anglican and Presbyterian churches.”

Contemporary legislators have the hubris to believe that the Founders hadn’t envisioned any kind of technological advances in firearm technology. It’s an argument tantamount to claiming that free-speech protections are not operable because James Madison couldn’t foresee the incredible speed with which information can be disseminated on the Internet.

Not only did legislators in the late 18th-century witness the advent and adoption of long-range Pennsylvania rifles — ones that could fire at 300 yards with decent precision rather than 50 yards with none — but they were likely acquainted with the existence of weapons such as air-powered repeating rifles that could fire .46-caliber lead balls about 40 times before losing muzzle velocity. No Founder ever said, “hey maybe we a mistake.” In fact, in the subsequent 150 years — through the rise of the revolver, the repeating rifle, and the gas-powered automatic weapons — no one ever challenged the idea that the Second Amendment protected anything but an individual right. Heller, the decision that so infuriated leftists, simply reaffirmed what had been obvious to everyone since 1789.

The Second Amendment is predicated on the principle that people have the right defend themselves and their liberties. The right to bear arms, in fact, is older than the right to free speech or freedom of religion. The English Bill of Rights, a document cataloging the crimes of James II and codifying the “ancient and indubitable” rights of English citizens in 1689, includes the right “arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.” Well, for Protestants. By 1765, William Blackstone, whose writings helped define the English common-law legal system, wrote that “the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression.”

Not one Founder mentioned anything about “hunting” or “skeet shooting” during the debates over the drafting of the Constitution.

The founding generation believed that firearms should be used to guarantee the universal and inalienable liberties of the people laid out in the Constitution — whether they were in the government or not. Thankfully, there is no need of insurrection now. But the presence of armed citizenry is always a good bulwark against tyranny. Just in case.

And a musket simply won’t do.

Friday, October 9th. is the deadline!

You can use the DMV Electronic Voter Registration Application to register to vote or to update the information you have on file with the New York State Board of Elections. The last day to register to vote in the upcoming General Election is October 9, 2020.

Online

You can use the DMV Electronic Voter Registration Application to register to vote or to update the information you have on file with the New York State Board of Elections.

Updated information could include providing your County or City Board of Elections with your new name, new address, or changing a party enrollment. We forward completed applications to the appropriate County or City Board of Elections for approval and processing. Learn more about Electronic Voter Registration.

To register you will need

• your New York State DMV issued driver license, permit or Non-Driver ID
  • it must be your most recently issued document - you will need the ID Number and document number (See Sample Documents)
• the ZIP Code currently on record with the DMV 
• the last 4 digits of your Social Security Number (SSN)

Register to vote or update your voter registration information

If you are having trouble registering online

Make sure you enter

• your document number correctly - it's easy to mix characters, like the number '1' for the letter 'I'
• the ZIP Code we currently have on record (we might not be aware of a recent move)

If you created MyDMV account before, you can log into that to access the voter registration application. 

If you do not have your most recent New York State DMV issued identification (license, permit or non-driver ID) or were never issued a New York State DMV identification document, you cannot register online through DMV.  You will need to register by mail or in person. 

By mail

To register by mail, visit the New York State Board of Elections website to download a Voter Registration Form. The form provides the mailing address for your local Board of Elections. 

In person

You can register to vote at your county board of elections, or at a New York State Agency - Based registration center.  The New York State Board of Elections website has. Visit the Voter Registration webpage at the New York State Board of Elections for more information.

What happens to my voter registration application?

The electronic voter registration application is transferred from DMV to your County or City Board of Elections for review. Once processed, your County or City will notify you either that you are registered to vote or additional information is needed to complete your application. (Please allow up to six weeks to hear from the Board of Elections in your County or City. If after 6 weeks you have not heard from them, contact them at the phone number or address provided on the New York State Board of Elections website.)

The DMV does not approve or deny voter registration applications. We only send the application to the County or City Board of Elections for their review.

Northwell Health, the largest health system and largest private employer in New York State, has announced a research study called, bizarrely, “We Ask Everyone. Firearm Safety is a Health Issue.” The project will require, as part of routine screening of emergency room patients, asking questions about firearm ownership and guns in the home. Implementation will begin at three Northwell hospitals initially (two on Long Island and one on Staten Island), with plans to expand the program to include “inpatient and ambulatory settings” across all of its facilities.

One of the physicians heading the project states that the objective of the universal screening is to create “opportunities for patients to speak with their trusted clinical teams about firearm safety and recognize firearm safety as a health care issue,” and that, “by asking the right questions and providing the right education and connections to resources,” the project “can prove to be a significant tool in fighting the gun violence epidemic.”

Northwell Health has reportedly refused to disclose what the questions will be, although the responses will be “scored and embedded into the patient’s electronic health record,” and used to  “establish next steps for care.”

It’s not clear how this squares with the Affordable Care Act, 42 U.S.C.A. § 300gg-17(c), and the prohibition against a health care provider, a wellness and prevention plan manager, or a health, wellness or prevention services organization requiring disclosure of or collecting information on lawful ownership of firearms or firearms stored or kept in a residence, but the program is being funded by a $1.4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health.

Residents of the Empire State need to understand how “We Ask Everyone” dovetails with an existing law on mandatory mental health reporting and disarming gun owners. 

Under 2013’s SAFE Act, the drastic gun control legislation passed by the New York State Legislature and signed into law by Governor Andrew Cuomo, an amendment to the state Mental Hygiene Law created a mandatory reporting requirement for mental health professionals. Physicians, psychologists, registered nurses, and licensed clinical social workers providing treatment services are now required to report any client that, in the exercise of reasonable professional judgment, the treatment provider considers “likely to engage in conduct that would result in serious harm to self or others.” If a local government official agrees with the report, the report must be shared with the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services to disarm persons in possession of a state firearms license and guns.

The law confines the use of the report exclusively to the question of the person’s ability to own or possess firearms; it is not used for treatment or to safeguard other persons who may be at risk. 

Persons who have been reported do not have access to the report or to the name of the reporting treatment provider. There is no due process, hearing, adjudication of mental illness or determination of dangerousness, or a requirement for a court order. Once the division of criminal justice services is notified, if the person has a firearm license or has applied for one, the license is automatically revoked, and the person must surrender the license and all firearms, or the firearms will be confiscated by law enforcement. The whole scheme rests on an assertion by a treatment provider that cannot be challenged by the person affected.

Many in the mental health care community resented being transformed into agents of the state and questioned the effectiveness of the law. The New York State Psychiatric Association, an association representing psychiatrists practicing in the state that “supports gun control measures in general,” opposed the reporting requirement and its focus on guns rather than mental health: “Following discussions with OMH [New York State Office of Mental Health] staff, it has become clear that the intent of the SAFE Act reporting requirement is solely to limit access to legal firearms and not to protect individuals from imminent risk of harm to self or others.”

A New York Times article published the year after the requirement became law confirmed there were significant failures in design and implementation. First, the “threshold for reporting is so low” that “frontline mental health workers feel compelled to routinely report mentally ill patients brought to an emergency room.” The resulting volume of reports meant that local health officials were rubber-stamping reports, with no effective oversight or review before a report was passed on to the division of criminal justice services. There was also no way to verify independently whether the law was being applied appropriately and whether the individuals being reported did in fact pose a risk of serious harm.

By 2014, over 34,000 individuals had been reported under this SAFE Act provision; another source suggests that as of late 2015, about 2,000 New Yorkers a month were being added to the database. The Times article observed that “the overwhelming majority of reports from mental health professionals are coming from hospitals … with an emergency room and inpatient psychiatric services.”

Under the Northwell project, regardless of the reason a person presents themselves at the emergency room –food poisoning, car accident, or COVID -19 – the patient will face questioning about guns. In a public health context where firearms are viewed as unhealthy and gun ownership as pathological, it isn’t terribly hard to imagine how this information may be used to support a claim that a gun owner “is likely to engage in conduct that would result in serious harm to self or others.”

While New York’s website advises that the SAFE Act “should not dissuade any individual from seeking mental health services they need,” the reality is that it forces gun owners to choose between getting such treatment and retaining their gun rights, and makes everyone less safe. “We Ask Everyone” implicates the same dysfunctional dynamic.

A Closer Look at Kamala Harris’ Second Amendment Record by Susanne Edward, September 4, 2020

Though the mainstream media and its flock of so-called “fact-checkers” might be intent on sanitizing Kamala Harris’ stance on the Second Amendment before the election on November 3, her words have left little to the imagination when it comes to how far she is willing to go to disarm you.

Like the vast majority of her party in 2020, Harris has advocated for more regulation when it comes to such policy matters as “universal” background checks and outlawing whole classes of firearms, including naming specific makes and models of popular rifles. Harris even co-sponsored Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-Calif.) latest attempt at an “assault-weapons” ban. 

During an appearance on comedian Jimmy Fallon’s show in September last year, amid her own failed Presidential bid, Senator Harris (D-Calif.) explained her push for “mandatory buybacks,” a politically correct euphemism for confiscation, as “mandatory” means you must comply.

“They are weapons of war with no place on the streets of a civil society. I've seen assault weapons kill babies and police officers,” said Harris.

A month later, at a March for Our Lives-hosted “gun-safety” event, Harris declared that “we have to have a buyback program.”

“And I support a buyback program. It’s got to be smart. We’ve got to do it the right way,” she said. “But there are five million (assault weapons) at least, some estimate as many as 10 million, and we’re going to have to have smart public policy that’s about taking those off the streets but doing it the right way.”

Can her desire be more explicit?

Throughout the presidential campaign she eventually abandoned, Harris claimed that she would evade the legislative branch to achieve her objectives. During one debate, she said, “Upon being elected, I will give the United States Congress 100 days to get their act together and have the courage to pass reasonable gun safety laws. And if they fail to do it, then I will take executive action.”

But even the mainstream media, which typically supports a staunch anti-gun agenda, have been busily trying to softenHarris’s image when it comes to firearms; perhaps these media members realize that her harsh stance could turn away the millions of new gun owners now endeavoring the protect themselves and their families. 

After a Facebook post of a private citizen erroneously attributing a gun confiscation quote to Harris made the rounds this past month, USA Today and Snopes jumped on board with a “false” fact rating. Technically, their assessment is defensible, but the idea that Harris does not support a plan to take firearms from the homes of gun owners isn’t exactly a given. 

If a “mandatory buyback” of “assault weapons,” a term that can only be defined politically, was indeed enacted under a Biden-Harris administration, wouldn’t law enforcement be used if some people did not comply?

In 2018, at a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Harris said she was for “common-sense” laws, and claimed that “it’s a false choice to suggest that you are either in favor of the Second Amendment or you want to take everyone’s guns away.”

But under the national spotlight, Harris has dropped any nuance on the issue and is now publicly in favor of every flavor of gun control that has thus far been dreamed up by the left.

(America's First Freedom, NRA, by Susanne Edward, September 4, 2020)

New Gun Law Takes Effect – Intoxicated While Hunting

Last fall in 2019 Governor Cuomo signed a law that lowers the legal blood alcohol threshold while hunting from 0.10 to 0.08, similar to the current level for operating a car or boat. The penalty remains the same. The law just took effect September 1st, 2020.

Anyone convicted of hunting while intoxicated stands to lose their hunting-related licenses for a period not to exceed two years. The crime is classified as a misdemeanor, punishable by up to, but not more than one year in jail, and/or a fine of no more than $500.

Posted on August 7, 2020 by AmmoLand Editor Jim Grant  

By Larry Keane

U.S.A. -(AmmoLand.com)- Everytown for Gun Safety continued its Veepstakes auditions as Michigan Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer joined Shannon Watts to talk about her gun control credentials.

Gov. Whitmer’s highlight of the event was boasting about putting 6,600 Michiganders in the firearm and ammunition industry out of work by deeming them “non-essential” during the coronavirus pandemic. Most of their industry peers across the United States could remain on the job. Gov. Whitmer, though, shuttered gun businesses in her state and was proud of it on her Everytown Veepstakes tryout with Shannon Watts.

“I would do it again. I absolutely stand by the decision that I made,” Gov. Whitmer said. “I’m not going to apologize. And I’m not going to be bullied into doing things differently…It was very clear, the purchase of a gun does not fall in that [life-sustaining] criteria.”

Should she be 2020 presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s running mate, Gov. Whitmer would fit the ticket. Former Vice President Biden’s antigun track record is well-known and he’s had his own run-in with Michigan gun owners, scolding one Detroit Second Amendment supporter, saying “You’re full of sh*t!” Together the two would make for the most antigun presidential ticket in modern history.

For Safety and Security

Watts dismissed concerns Michiganders have for their personal safety. She went as far as labeling the more than 2.5 million Americans who bought a gun for the first time as just “the gun extremist community.” Gov. Whitmer blamed President Donald Trump.

“That is just the kind of dog-whistle that always makes me fearful that we’ll have more violence break out across the country.” She glossed over the numerous examples of law-abiding Americans protecting themselves, their families, their businesses, and their neighbors.

For her part, Gov. Whitmer supports reinstating the failed 1994 Assault Weapons Ban and gun control grab bag favorites like “red flag” laws that deny due process to the accused, closing loopholes that are in fact just the Second Amendment and more. There’s just one problem keeping her from getting her way – voters.

“I can’t just change these laws on my own,” Gov. Whitmer said. “I need a legislature to work with me. I don’t have a legislature that is very friendly when it comes to working on this issue.”

Gov. Whitmer is correct, though she did not make the point she thought she was making.

Biden and Beyond in November

Gov. Whitmer praised Biden’s candidacy and what it could mean for stricter gun control.

“With Joe Biden in the White House we’re going to have a leader who makes decisions based on the best information there is, so that we have higher odds of achieving all the goals that he’s running on,” Gov. Whitmer told Watts. “He’s the perfect candidate at this time.”

Former Vice President Biden’s gun control “goals” also include appointing former U.S. Congressman Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke (D-Texas) as his chief gun-grabbing sheriff to confiscate 18 million of the most popular selling centerfire semiautomatic rifles in America. His ‘leadership’ includes telling his wife to blindly fire a shotgun into the air without knowing the target and suggesting police try their best to shoot threatening armed attackers in the leg. He called the firearm industry “the enemy” and wants to dismantle it.

Not everyone agrees with Biden or Gov. Whitmer on these extremist ideas. An NSSF survey of likely voters in 18 battleground states, including Michigan, showed that enforcing existing gun laws and protecting lawful firearm sales are at the top of their minds heading into November. NSSF regularly updates the #GUNVOTE online resource so voters don’t risk their rights in the ballot box.

About The National Shooting Sports Foundation

NSSF is the trade association for the firearm industry. Its mission is to promote, protect and preserve hunting and the shooting sports. Formed in 1961, NSSF has a membership of thousands of manufacturers, distributors, firearm retailers, shooting ranges, sportsmen’s organizations, and publishers nationwide. For more information, visit nssf.org

Established in 1975, the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) is the “lobbying” arm of the National Rifle Association of America. ILA is responsible for preserving the right of all law-abiding individuals in the legislative, political, and legal arenas, to purchase, possess and use firearms for legitimate purposes as guaranteed by the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Visit: www.nra.org