Brady Head Claims ‘Fearmongering’ Driving Up Gun Sales in Virginia

Kris Brown has been in charge of Brady for almost eight years now, and has worked in the gun control lobby for nearly a decade; long enough that I wonder if she’s not a little burnt out by now. 

Some of Brown’s recent statements are so tired and stale that it seems like she’s just on autopilot, or maybe using AI to come up with her talking points. The latest example of her laziness comes from her Substack, in a piece that claims (yawn) Virgiinia Democrats “chose children over the gun lobby” by passing a slew of gun control measures, including bans on commonly owned arms that aren’t commonly used in crime.

Brown kicks off her piece with the complaint that she’s “carried the weight of a heavy juxtaposition” over the past four years; heading up anti-2A group while her “own state suffered gun violence deaths and injuries under an extremist governor who blocked every meaningful reform passed by the legislature.” 

In truth, Virginia’s violent crime rate is and has been well below the national average, and is much lower than neighboring Maryland, where the gun laws are much more restrictive. Calling Glenn Youngkin an “extremist” is downright laughable, but it’s not the cringiest part of Brown’s diatribe. That’s reserved for Brown’s attempt explain away the sharp rise in gun sales in Virginia in recent months. According to the gun control activist, it’s not a logical response to cornucopia of gun control measures introduced and passed by the Democrats in control of the state government. Oh no, it’s all because Brown’s fellow Virginians are just gullible dupes of gun makers. 

 None of this is radical. But keep in mind that sensible gun laws don’t grow the gun industry’s bottom line, especially when it just fearmongered Virginians into buying more guns last month in advance of these laws than they did even a year ago. Most gun owners support secure firearm storage and other efforts to keep guns away from dangerous individuals. Large majorities of Americans, including gun owners, support regulating ghost guns like other firearms. Most Virginians understand that freedom goes hand-in-hand with safety and responsibility.

That has always been the real debate. Not whether Americans can or should own firearms. But whether we are willing to take reasonable and responsible steps to prevent tragedies before they happen. Virginia answered the question last week.

Brown knows darn well that the surge in gun sales that we’ve seen in Virginia over the past few months (and not just in April) is the result of Democrats introducing an onslaught of bills targeting commonly owned firearms. In addition to the 20 bills that were approved by the General Assembly, we also saw measures that would have imposed an 11% tax on firearms and ammunition and a $500 tax on suppressors. That alone is enough to juice sales, but when you add in a ban on the sale of the most popular rifles in the country and other commonly-owned firearms its no surprise that Virginians are flocking to buy these products while they still can. 

In her intellectual laziness, Brown manages to brazenly contradict herself. She says that “sensible gun laws don’t grown the industry’s bottom line,” which indicates that she’s well aware these laws will make it harder to lawfully purchase guns and exercise our Second Amendment rights. Then she turns around and claims that the “real debate” in this country isn’t about whether or not Americans can or should own firearms, even though her own organization’s website says right on it’s homepage that “If guns made us safer, we’d be the safest country in the world.” 

I don’t know about you, but that sure sounds like Brady doesn’t think we should own guns to me. And historically, that’s been Brady’s position. It’s argued that we have no Second Amendment right to own or carry firearms and that handgun bans are a positive good, not an infringement on a fundamental right. 

My advice to Kris Brown? If you’re burnt out and bored, try shaking things up a little and stop lying to your intended audience. Be bold and bluntly honest about what you really want. Quit pretending that your goal is “gun safety” when it’s really about curbing gun ownership. And admit that you’re okay with a spike in gun sales in the short term if it means no sales of so-called assault firearms in the future. 

Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.

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