The Trace’s Push Against Republican Anti-Red Flag Efforts Sure Picked the Wrong Day to Publish

The Trace likes red flag laws. As they’re funded by Michael Bloomberg, that’s about as surprising as the sun rising in the east. Time and time again, the “gun violence newsroom” is almost exclusively about gun control, just like everyone else who uses euphemisms to pretend they’re neutral when they’re not.

So, it’s not surprising that they ran this piece last week, trying to bash Republicans throughout the nation for opposing, or outright banning, red flag laws.

n May 18, 2018, a teenager at Santa Fe High School in Texas walked into the school armed with his father’s guns and opened fire, killing eight students and two teachers. Evidence later showed the teen had been experiencing a severe and spiraling mental health crisis leading up to the attack. 

But Texas had no mechanism that would have allowed law enforcement or anyone else to petition a court to temporarily remove firearms from the home. Last year, the state made sure it never would: Lawmakers banned extreme risk protection orders, which allow police and families to ask judges to temporarily remove guns from dangerous people.

Christina Delgado, a Santa Fe resident who became a gun reform advocate after the shooting, told state lawmakers the attack might have been prevented with the kind of legal remedy the bill sought to ban. “Had timely and appropriate intervention and support been provided to that family, a different outcome may have been achieved,” she told a Texas Senate committee considering the bill.

They still passed the measure. And Texas is not alone. A growing number of states are outlawing the orders meant to quickly — and temporarily — take guns from people at imminent risk of hurting themselves or others.

ERPO laws, also known as red flag laws, once enjoyed support from across the political spectrum, including from President Donald Trump and the National Rifle Association, which in 2018 advocated federal funding to help states implement the measures. Now, six states have prohibited enforcing the orders — and in some cases, prescribed fines or criminal charges for officials who try. Three other states are considering similar bans in 2026.

Now, we’ve talked about the problems with red flag laws a thousand times. Perhaps, though, something that happened the same day this was published might highlight one big problem, in that they don’t work.

See, this was published April 16th. What else happened that day? Ironically, that’s when the news broke that the former Lt. Governor of Virginia, who famously broke a tie vote to pass Virginia’s red flag law, murdered his wife before killing himself.

Justin Fairfax isn’t the only potentially homicidal person elected to statewide office in Virginia, of course, as the current attorney general harbors similar fantasies, but he’s the only one recently who has carried them out, and he did it with a firearm despite being fiercely anti-gun. In other words, he was someone The Trace thought of as an ally, and who also supported red flag laws, only for this to happen.

Now, understand that I’m not making light of anything. The irony is a sad one. Fairfax was clearly troubled and should have gotten help, not a gun. Even if he’d just taken his own life, it would be sad enough, but at least his wife would still be alive.

See, the issue with red flag laws is that there are so many cases where clearly dangerous people aren’t hit with an order because people really don’t think they’ll do anything, all while others are hit with a red flag order because others are overreacting.

Then, advocates and the media use the number of orders issued to determine if the law is working or not, and literally nothing else. In fairness, those are easy numbers to find, and one would think that if such a law is being used, then at least some of the people being caught up are actually dangerous people, but there’s really not much evidence of that.

Practically none, actually.

So while The Trace is going after Republicans for blocking ERPOs, literally, we’re learning that a leading proponent of these measures, who is the reason Virginia got one, didn’t get hit with it despite what we can now see as clear evidence that he probably should have.

There’s nothing funny about it. It’s just sad.

What’s even sadder is that we know there are a lot more cases than this, but this one made headlines because of how high-profile the killer was before he turned to murder.

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