If endorsements are anything to judge by, every gun-control group hopes Abigail Spanberger (D) will be the next governor of Virginia. But Spanberger doesn’t want this to be what voters in Virginia are talking about. She has instead been working to convince people she is a moderate on the question of the right to keep and bear arms.
On the stump, Spanberger offers up all the usual euphemisms, deflections and clichés. When pushed to characterize her views, she explains that she’s not in favor of gun control, but of “common-sense proposals.” When accused of being too radical on the Second Amendment, she reports that she “grew up in a family where responsible gun ownership was the norm.” When challenged on her plan to micromanage how you may defend yourself and your family, she recalls that, during her time working at the U.S. Postal Service, she “carried a firearm every single day.” Pick a bromide, banality or buzzword, and you can be sure that Spanberger has uttered it.
Her platform is a different matter. Like many of the other pretend-centrists on the Left, Spanberger supports the typical laundry list of unconstitutional gun-control policies, and she advances the typical set of thoughtless arguments in their favor. She wants to make it illegal for law-abiding citizens to purchase, sell or transfer the most-popular rifles in America. She wants to outlaw magazines that can hold more than 10 rounds.
Her record shows her to be a Northeastern-style progressive who wants a long list of restrictions to be enacted in the state. In 2018, at an event sponsored by the gun-control group Everytown for Gun Safety, she argued that law-abiding Virginians are to blame for the actions of criminals by repeating talking points from anti-gun organizations that we need yet more onerous regulations on those who already obey the law. She does not argue that we need to catch and prosecute criminals. She argues that American freedom is the cause of crime. Indeed, Spanberger served as a volunteer for the gun-control group Moms Demand Action in Virginia’s Henrico County.
Spanberger not only supports Virginia’s absurd one-handgun-per-month law, but, as a member of Congress, she attempted to impose it nationally. If the Virginia legislature passes a gun-control law, Spanberger says she will sign it. Unlike Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R), she vows she “will not veto common-sense proposals.” To her, it is common sense to infringe on Virginian’s Second Amendment-protected rights by stopping, for example, an uncle from gifting a shotgun to a niece before they pay for a background check; to her, it is common sense to ban commonly owned rifles; to her, it is common sense to allow bureaucrats to mandate how guns are stored in resident’s homes.
Now, it is usually safe to assume that politicians whose crime-stopping agendas revolve around the regulation of non-criminals have a different agenda than stopping crime. And, sure enough, Spanberger provides no exception to this rule. Spanberger’s preferred policies are solely focused on the people who do not pose a problem. Her goals are not about creating a safer state but are, instead, focused on making Virginia into a place in which citizens are disempowered and the government is central.
One might have assumed that, having grown up in a family of responsible gun owners, Spanberger would understand that imposing more regulations upon the peaceful will do nothing helpful whatsoever—and, indeed, that it will serve only to hinder civil society’s first line of defense. Alas, one would have assumed wrong. In Spanberger’s politics, bureaucratic control is everything. To her, the state is central and we are all subservient to it.
Her opponent, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears (R), is the exact opposite. Sears is for individual freedom. Sears backs law enforcement and the rule of law. She wants to catch and prosecute bad guys, not to disarm and infringe upon the rights of law-abiding citizens.
Many media outlets are not clearly explaining these two candidates’ very different positions on this constitutional issue. Nevertheless, Virginians need to know the truth behind the rhetoric, as their freedom is on the ballot in this election.
