The Maine Gun Security Coalition is pushing to go a brand new crimson flag gun regulation, deploying greater than 500 volunteers at over 100 polling areas on election day final Tuesday. Volunteers had been tasked with gathering signatures for the group’s “Protected Faculties, Protected Communities” marketing campaign.
The marketing campaign is allegedly a part of an effort to deal with the state’s excessive fee of suicide in addition to gun violence normally, with the Maine Gun Security Coalition arguing that having the intense danger safety order, also referred to as a crimson flag regulation, would have prevented the Lewiston mass capturing on October 25, 2023, which left 18 folks lifeless and 13 injured.
The chief administrators of the group stress they’ve been pushing for a crimson flag regulation for about 5 years.
“I feel this can be a small step in the correct path towards frequent sense gun security within the state, that is one thing that frankly the legislature tried and may have been in a position to go, haven’t been in a position to do it, requires voters to make their voice clear,” mentioned Xavier Botana of the Maine Gun Security Coalition.
Opponents of the proposed crimson flag regulation argue that it may be abused to limit a person’s Constitutional rights with out due course of, which is almost certainly the true intention of those that search these measures. Earlier than you accuse me of caring extra about Constitutional rights than human lives, nevertheless, I’m not saying nothing needs to be finished, I’m simply saying there are higher methods.
Maine itself already has a greater manner. The state is at the moment dwelling to the nation’s solely yellow flag regulation. Right here’s the way it works. Involved kinfolk of a member of the family struggling a psychological well being disaster who really feel she or he could also be a menace to the security and well-being of themselves or others could name regulation enforcement to hunt an order briefly proscribing that individual’s entry to firearms. Legislation enforcement then takes the person into non permanent custody till a medical analysis may be accomplished. If the outcomes decide the individual is a menace to themselves or others, the medical skilled certifies that the individual shouldn’t have entry to firearms. Right now a court docket could order police to take away firearms from the individual’s residence and limit them from possessing or sustaining firearms briefly.
The Maine Gun Security Coalition complains the yellow flag legal guidelines are too sophisticated, which calls into query their intent, competence, or each. In actual fact, Maine Governor Janet Mills established an unbiased seven-member fee to research the Lewiston capturing. After reviewing 1000’s of pages of paperwork, gathering details from witnesses, and conducting public conferences, the fee issued a 215-page ultimate report in August 2024, concluding that the police and the Military Reserve missed alternatives to stop the tragedy and that the shooter’s conduct offered enough proof for the native sheriff’s workplace to have obtained a yellow flag order to grab his weapons in September 2023, but failed to take action.
Whereas I acknowledge that some may lack belief within the integrity of yellow flag procedures, the purpose is that there are higher methods that don’t contain a no course of he mentioned, she mentioned protocol. A fast evaluate of the Maine Gun Security Coalition web site will paint a transparent image of what the group is all about, which is not any completely different than another anti-Second Modification group, simply hidden behind phrases like “gun security” and “frequent sense.” They wish to ban semi-automatic rifles, home-built firearms, and customary magazines, like all the remainder of them, eroding Constitutional liberties one after the other. There may be nothing “frequent sense” about permitting folks to take away the rights of people fully unchecked and with out due course of.
