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Not only has New Mexico’s Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham divorced herself from all reality, she is also divorcing herself from those most likely to support her: other Democrats.
On Tuesday, New Mexico State Attorney General Raul Torrez, a Democrat, wrote Grisham that she was on her own in defending herself against a slew of lawsuits her unconstitutional gun ban has drawn from various gun rights groups:
Though I recognize my statutory obligation as New Mexico’s chief legal officer to defend state officials when they are sued in their official capacity, my duty to uphold and defend the constitutional rights of every citizen takes precedence.
Simply put, I do not believe that [your] Emergency Order [EO] will have any meaningful impact on public safety but, more importantly, I do not believe it passes constitutional muster.
Torrez even asked her to rescind her EO:
While I understand that frustration may have led you to undertake a unilateral approach to addressing the heart-wrenching challenge of gun violence in our community, I urge you to reconsider this course of action.
Instead, the governor revealed her true nature not only as a tyrant willing to violate her own oath of office to support and defend both the New Mexico state constitution and the federal Constitution, but as a bully as well. She called out Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen, who had joined Torrez in declaring that her EO “will not do anything to curb gun violence other than punish law-abiding citizens from their constitutional right to self-defense.”
Her response? “Stop being squeamish … I will not back down.”
Other Democrats are calling for her impeachment. Wrote State Rep. John Block on Tuesday:
I have a newsflash for the Governor: The Second Amendment is an absolute right and so is my authority to impeach you for violating your oath to New Mexico and the United States.
Law-abiding gun owners rallied on Sunday and then again on Tuesday, this time at Albuquerque’s Civic Plaza, many of them exercising their right to openly carry a firearm. They were being observed by officers from the police department and the sheriff’s department, who didn’t interfere or arrest anyone for violating Grisham’s gun ban.
One of those attending the rally was Alicia Otero, whose son was killed in 2021. She held a poster that pointed to the sham promulgated by Grisham in her gun ban. Said the poster: “I blame the shooter! Not the gun!”
During an interview by a local news station, Otero expanded:
I’m here because I’m against gun violence and I’ve been crying to our governor to make changes and to hold the offenders accountable and now that she made this new order, it’s unfair to us because we’re scared.
After things like this happened, we need to protect ourselves and now she’s taking that away from us.
Other law enforcement officials are also standing up against Grisham’s gun ban, including Sheriff Allen (mentioned above), Albuquerque’s Police Chief Harold Medina, Bernalillo County’s District Attorney Sam Bregman, and the head of the New Mexico Chiefs of Police Association Steve Hebbe.
Said Hebbe:
A better place to start is for the governor to address the problem of pretrial release of people charged with violent crimes using a gun.
In other words, we [should] hold people accused of crime accountable, rather than citizens with Second Amendment rights to possess a firearm.
Bregman concurred:
As an officer of the court, I cannot and will not enforce something that is clearly unconstitutional.
[Instead] this office will continue to focus on criminals of any age that use guns in the commission of a crime.
At least four lawsuits have already been filed asking the court to issue a restraining order against Grisham’s unconstitutional ban, including those from the National Association of Gun Rights (NAGR), Gun Owners of America (GOA), Patriots USA, and a Bernalillo County resident and gun owner, Shawn Blas. More are expected.
On Wednesday afternoon a U.S. District Court judge in Albuquerque heard motions on just such a restraining order, and a ruling is expected shortly.
Such actions by a rogue politician, undeterred over concerns she might be violating her oath of office, are precisely the sort the Founders of our Republic feared the most. As President George Washington is reported to have said:
Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.
Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.
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Related article: New Mexico Gov. Faces Massive Outrage Over Unconstitutional Gun Ban
