In response to Buffalo shooting: NY Governor Kathy Hochul goes after gun rights, free speech
Apparently unwilling to wait on Washington to destroy the Bill of Rights following the mass shooting in Buffalo, NY, Governor Kathy Hochul has announced her intention to sign a truckload of executive orders aimed at destroying gun rights and free speech in the Empire State in the name of tackling “domestic terrorism.”
It was only yesterday that I reported how Joe Biden and other leftists in Washington had labeled the tragic Buffalo shooting an act of “domestic terrorism” in order to push passage of the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act (a bill that criminalizes free speech) but it looks like Hochul has decided to take destroying the Constitution into her own hands (via National Review):
New York Governor Kathy Hochul has announced a strict series of gun control regulations, days after a racially motivated shooting in Buffalo that killed ten people.
Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday afternoon, Hochul said that she would sign several executive orders to restrict access to firearms and monitor “online extremism.”
These include a measure authorizing the New York State Police to seize weapons from any gun owner “whenever they have probable cause to believe that an individual is a threat to themselves or others.” She did not give further details about the proposal, and the text of the order, yet to be signed, has not been released. However, she announced it would draw on authority conferred by the state’s “Red Flag Law” passed in 2019, which allows law enforcement to seize weapons when a court issues an Extreme Risk Protection Order against an individual.
Hochul also announced that a new ‘Office of Counterterrorism’ would be created within the State Police with an exclusive focus on “domestic terrorism,” which would be required to monitor social media for evidence of violent tendencies and extremist ideology. She added that she would formally refer social media companies to the New York Attorney General Letita James’s office for investigation for failing to stop “radicalization” of users towards “white supremacy.” That afternoon, James announced on Twitter that platforms “Twitch, 4chan, 8chan, and Discord” were under investigation.
Per ABC News, Hochul — who is running in November’s gubernatorial election — had planned the announcement before the Buffalo shooting, but delayed it to visit the city, which is her hometown, with President Joe Biden on Tuesday. (Emphasis mine)
Yeah, she planned it a loooooooooooong time ago, but decided to make her announcement when Joe Biden was in town to provide a nice photo op.
Joe Biden launched his “domestic terrorism” rhetoric immediately following the Buffalo tragedy ahead of his appearance with Hochul and before information about the shooter’s motivation was even known (via New York Post):
President Joe Biden called Saturday’s Buffalo supermarket attack “an act of domestic terrorism,” while the Department of Justice investigated the apparently racially motivated mass shooting as a hate crime.
Biden said “hearts all across this country are with the people of Buffalo” after a teenage gunman killed 10 people and injured three others at a Tops Friendly Market in a predominantly black neighborhood of the city.
“We still need to learn more about the motivation for today’s shooting as law enforcement does its work, but we don’t need anything else to state a clear moral truth: A racially motivated hate crime is abhorrent to the very fabric of this nation,” Biden said in a statement.
“Any act of domestic terrorism, including an act perpetrated in the name of a repugnant white nationalist ideology, is antithetical to everything we stand for in America. Hate must have no safe harbor. We must do everything in our power to end hate-fueled domestic terrorism.” (Emphasis mine)
However, Hochul went a step beyond Biden to include the denial of gun rights. Although, with enough time, Biden will likely throw gun control into the mix of government actions needed in response to the Buffalo shooting, just as he did last month in response to a shooting in Sacramento, CA.
Just like Joe Biden, NY Governor Kathy Hochul wants to establish her own *police state to silence the voices of dissent coming from people opposed to tyranny and oppression, aka domestic terrorism.
Kathy Hochul tying social media to free speech and gun rights isn’t a new idea. In December 2018, the New York legislature attempted to pass SB9191, a bill that would have given state and local police the green light to investigate for “commonly known profane slurs or biased language to describe race, national origin, ancestry, gender, religion, disability, or sexual orientation.”
Under the measure introduced by state Senator Kevin Parker (D-Brooklyn), gun-permit applicants would have been required to provide usernames and passwords to the state and give their consent for authorities to investigate 1-3 years of their search histories and social media accounts before being allowed to receive or renew a handgun permit in New York State.
You may be asking yourself why should we concern ourselves with the happenings in New York? The answer is simple: every bad federal law was at one time a bad state law.
Just like Joe Biden and the army of leftists running the Democrat Party, NY Governor Kathy Hochul is calling the Buffalo mass shooting an act of “domestic terrorism,” and she is using this designation as the perfect “never let a crisis go to waste” opportunity to issue a myriad of executive orders targeting free speech and gun rights.
It looks like the only place you’ll find the word “liberty” in New York is on an island known by that name found in Upper New York Bay; the same place where you’ll find a big, green statue of a lady that once stood as the universal symbol of freedom.
* A “police state” is defined as: a totalitarian state or country in which a national police force, esp. a secret police, suppresses any act that conflicts with government policy. (Random House Kernerman Webster’s College Dictionary, 2010)
David Leach is the owner of the Strident Conservative. He holds people of every political stripe accountable for their failure to uphold conservative values, and he promotes those values instead of political parties.
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