In July, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy launched an “unprecedented” effort to incorporate gun control into his “public health” portfolio. In so doing, he vindicated a stance NRA took back in 2013, during the second term of the Obama-Biden administration, when we opposed Murthy’s appointment to that office. We had no business, the media lectured, opposing the appointment of “America’s top doctor.” One media narrative even claimed that NRA was making America more vulnerable to an Ebola outbreak by opposing his nomination.
As we pointed out at the time, however, Murthy wasn’t just a doctor following “the science” wherever it led. He was an established gun-control activist who would try to portray “science” as supporting his preconceived political agenda, relying more on the prestige and credibility of his title than on evidence-based medicine.
Those predictions could not have been more fully realized than with the release of Murthy’s “U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory” entitled, “Firearm Violence: A Public Health Crisis in America.” Far from a work of science, it is simply a political tract that advocates for some of the same tired, unproven gun-control laws that firearm prohibitionists have been seeking since before Murthy even went to medical school. These include such non-medical interventions as criminal penalties for non-violent conduct, like simply owning America’s most-popular semi-automatic rifles.
Notably, the advisory has nothing to do with treating gunshot wounds, dealing with potential lead exposure from handling firearms or ammunition, preventing or treating hearing loss from exposure to muzzle reports, or any other medical issue pertaining to guns. Instead, it is a simply a taxpayer-funded tract that promotes the same tired slate of oppressive gun-control laws that Murthy’s fellow firearm prohibitionists have wanted for decades. It also seeks to provide cover for the disastrous crime-control failures of Murthy’s Democrat party by insisting that firearm assaults and homicides are akin to a disease or contagion rather than crimes committed by predators (most with lengthy records) who too often act with impunity.
It also puts a lie to Murthy’s own assertion, from his first confirmation hearing, that “I do not intend to use the surgeon general’s office as a bully pulpit for gun control.” While it took his second appointment under the Biden-Harris administration for Murthy to go all-in on gun control as surgeon general, that was obviously the plan all along.
Murthy now portrays his public re-embrace of gun control as if it were the “data-driven” result of his highly dubious claim (which had already been a favorite of his patron in the White House) that guns are the “the leading cause of death among our children and teenagers.” That is a slightly more-sophisticated version of a similar claim often repeated by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris that guns are the leading cause of death of “children.”
Even liberal fact-checkers have refuted the White House version, but Murthy’s is only slightly less dishonest with the inclusion of “teens.” The fact is, violent criminality peaks in the late teens to mid-20s. So the inclusion of 18- and 19-year-olds pulls in crime-involved young adults who are both the predominant perpetrators of and victims of firearm-related assaults and homicides.
The fact that Murthy and others who use this talking point want to obscure the truth, rather than illuminate it, speaks to their motivations. Violence arising from rivalries between criminals on the street is not the same problem, nor is it amenable to the same solutions, as the far-less-frequent ways actual children die from gunfire (chiefly suicide, accidents or random attacks). And once these young adult criminals are removed from the equation, firearm-related mortality is not even close to the leading cause of death for actual children ages 0 to 14.
Firearm-prohibitionists are counting on the idea that Murthy will be an effective advocate for their agenda, as he supposedly speaks from a “professional” point of view that is somehow above politics. Yet Murthy has not discovered a new and innovative approach to using “medicine” or public-health approaches to reducing firearm-related mortality. He is simply hoping to portray politics-as-usual with his professional pedigree.
This is exactly what NRA warned he would do. It took time and a second appointment to his post, but Murthy has confirmed our prognosis for the exploitation of his office.
Even as his party shuns enforcement of existing laws against real criminals, Murthy would turn law-abiding gun owners into criminals to make America “healthier.” That is a prescription for failure.
