How California’s Training Mandate Is Racist

The history of gun control in America has its roots in racism. Many of the first gun control laws were created not to increase public safety so much as to disarm groups that were disfavored, including Native Americans and freed black men and women. While anti-gunners of today would probably argue that the policies they push are nothing of the sort, they also tend to see any racial disparity in the impact of a law as a sign of racism.

Unless, I guess, they’re the ones doing it.

Over at our sister site, Townhall, my friend Jeff Charles brought up a pretty good point about California’s proposed training mandate.

What the state’s anti-gunners won’t tell you is how it will affect low-income populations. Becoming a gun owner in California is already quite expensive. They must first obtain a Firearm Safety Certificate after passing a written test and paying $25 for a five-year credential. They have to also cover $37.19 in state Dealer Record of Sale fees per transaction as well as dealer transfer charges that can range from $10 to over $100.

On top of that, California imposes an 11 percent excise tax on firearms and ammunition in addition to local sales taxes. Of course, this is only if one wants to have the gun in their home. Those who wish to carry concealed must obtain a permit that involves even more expenses, including a mandatory 16-hour training course that typically costs several hundred dollars along with application and background check fees that can push the total to $500 or more in many jurisdictions.

Under the new bill, gun owners would have to pay even more to complete a four-hour safety course that includes at least one hour of live-fire training. Gun rights groups estimate this could add at least $400 to the cost of purchasing a gun through instructor fees, ammunition, rentals, and range time.

You know who can’t afford all this? Low-income Californians who happen to be mostly black and Hispanic. And this, ladies and gentlemen, is how Democrats love to ensure that racial minorities are unable to arm themselves, leaving them vulnerable to violent criminals.

Most anti-gunners aren’t as anti-gun as they want you to believe. They want the police to have guns. They’re fine with the elites having them. They just don’t want people like you to have them, and they definitely don’t want “those sorts” having them, either.

So, they keep upping the price so the lower income brackets can’t afford anything, and as Jeff points out, that tends to disproportionally impact black and Hispanic residents of California. The fact that these are also the people who typically live in high-crime areas and are the ones who would most benefit from having a firearm isn’t lost on me in the least.

And California’s anti-gun Democrats know this, even if they’ve somehow deluded themselves into failing to add two and two here. They often talk about the poor, how it’s disproportionately black and Hispanic communities in states like California, and how it’s not right that they have to pay for certain things, but they don’t blink about jacking up the price of exercising those same communities’ Second Amendment rights.

They know it, and they’re doing it anyway.

I don’t buy the argument that every disparity of outcome is proof of racism. I will, however, buy the argument that knowing that disparity is coming and doing it anyway is.

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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