Virginia Democrats began to ram through their gun control agenda on Tuesday after tens of thousands of peaceful pro-Second Amendment activists protested in the state’s capital at the start of the week.
“The day after a massive gathering of gun-rights activists at the Virginia Capitol, the state Senate on Tuesday advanced legislation that would allow authorities to take guns away from people deemed dangerous to themselves or others,” the Associated Press reported, adding that Virginia Democrats also killed GOP-backed measures including “a bill to allow people to carry concealed handguns without a permit and to repeal a limit on carrying weapons in churches and other places of worship.”
The move by Virginia Democrats comes a day after 22,000 protesters flooded the streets of Richmond to protest Democrats’ extreme anti-freedom agenda, which has included proposals for confiscating legally owned firearms from law-abiding citizens.
“The grassroots resistance to Virginia Democrats’ extreme anti-Second Amendment agenda has exploded as nearly 90% of the counties in the state have declared themselves to be sanctuary cities in response to the Democrats’ anti-freedom agenda,” The Daily Wire reported in November. “More than 100 cities, towns, and counties have passed resolutions in preparation for Democrats taking over the state who had indicated a desire to confiscate semi-automatic firearms from law-abiding citizens.”
The reaction to Democrats’ agenda in the state has been so intense that The Washington Examiner reported on Tuesday that lawmakers in West Virginia are now considering accepting counties that want to leave Virginia.
West Virginia lawmakers are scrambling to let rural Virginia counties join the Mountain State amid conservative voter anger with the new Democratic majority in Richmond and its push for gun control and other liberal initiatives.
In a building fight that echoes the Civil War-era split of the Old Dominion that created West Virginia in 1863, 40 of 100 West Virginia House delegates have signed on to legislation that would accept revolting Virginia counties and towns.
West Virginia Del. Gary Howell told The Examiner that the idea initially started out as a long shot but “has turned into a real thing.”
Howell introduced HCR 8 to the West Virginia legislature, which states in part:
These tensions have been compounded by a perception of contempt on the part of the government at Richmond for the differences in certain fundamental political and societal principles which prevail between the varied counties and cities of that Commonwealth.
In the latest, and most evident, in this string of grievances, the government at Richmond now seeks to place intolerable restraints upon the rights guaranteed under the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution to the citizens of that Commonwealth.
…
In a spirit of conciliation, the legislature of West Virginia hereby extends an invitation to our fellow Virginians who wish to do so, to join us in our noble experiment of 156 years of separation from the government at Richmond; and, we extend an invitation to any constituent county or city of the Commonwealth of Virginia to be admitted to the body politic of the state of West Virginia.
President Donald Trump commented on Monday’s pro-Second Amendment rally, writing on Twitter: “I will NEVER allow our great Second Amendment to go unprotected, not even a little bit!”
I will NEVER allow our great Second Amendment to go unprotected, not even a little bit!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 20, 2020