Texas Lawmakers Looking to End State Fair Gun Ban

The Texas State Fair angered a lot of Texans when they tried to ban guns. 

The whole situation started a year earlier when a shooting took place. Fair officials, understandably, wanted to prevent a similar situation from happening again. The problem is that they decided to just ban guns. In Texas.

State fairs are generally pretty rural in their focus, which means this fair pretty much went against most of their potential customer base.

Folks weren’t thrilled and lawsuits started flying.

Now, lawmakers are looking to get involved.

Last year’s controversial ban on concealed carry at the Texas State Fair, which spawned a number of lawsuits including some after the fair had closed, has now forced pro-gun lawmakers to introduce legislation barring such a ban.

Republican State Rep. Brisco Cain recently filed a measure to prevent the prohibition of firearms carried by licensed concealed carriers on government-owned property.

According to the text of HB 1715, any government entities, courts or contractors who use such properties “may not in any manner prohibit a license holder who is carrying a handgun under the authority of Subchapter H, Chapter 411, Government Code, from entering or remaining on the property or a portion of the property, including through the provision of notice by a communication described by Section 30.06 or 30.07, Penal Code, unless license holders are otherwise prohibited from carrying handguns on the property or that portion of the property under Section 46.03, Penal Code, or other law.”

Naturally, the law would prohibit banning carry at State Fair Park, which is owned by the city of Dallas and serves as the venue for the annual State Fair of Texas.

The bill addresses a certain degree of ambiguity or confusion with existing state law, which created enough of a loophole that the fair figured they could get away with banning guns.

This bill would close that potential loophole and close it hard.

Unless the property in question is one already covered under existing law, people who rent a venue can’t decide to remake the rules.

They might still be able to ask someone to leave if they’re carrying a firearm, but they can’t just blanket ban guns, and that was the crux of the problem.

It’s unfortunate that this wasn’t in place last year, but far too often, we only see the problem with existing laws when someone finds a way around those existing laws.

Yes, one of the most dangerous phrases in the English language is, “There ought to be a law,” but sometimes, there really ought to be one, particularly when the law in question preserves people’s rights. That includes the right to keep and bear arms.

Texas may well end up making the right move and put an end to this flavor of stupidity once and for all, but there are also going to be a lot of people that will work against this effort.

Folks in the Lonestar State need to step up and make their voices heard on this. If you don’t, nothing will change, and that could result in the next shooting at something like the state fair far worse because there’s no chance of a good guy with a gun being there to change things.