Floundering Donald Trump flip flops yet again
As is the case for pretty much every position Donald Trump has ever held, he has changed his mind again. This time it is whether or not he would support a ban on assault weapons. Today the White House announced that Trump in fact does NOT support a ban on “assault weapons.” Part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1944 included a prohibition on the manufacture or civilian use of certain semi-automatic firearms it defined as assault weapons, as well as certain ammunition magazines it defined as “large capacity”. However, the bill was only a 10-year ban, ending in 2004.
In his book “The America We Deserve” written back in 2000, Trump said there were too many GOP members who “walk the NRA line and refuse even limited restrictions on gun purchases.” In that same book Trump also claimed that the murder rate in the United States was directly related to the availability and ease of obtaining assault weapons.
As he has done on pretty much every position, Trump flip-flopped during the 2016 presidential campaign to better align himself with the NRA and using the common GOP fear mongering tactic of claiming all Democrats were going to take away everyone’s guns, which, as we know, has never happened. However, the NRA loves that rhetoric as the gullible conservatives quickly purchase more guns allowing gun manufacturers to make much more money.
Today, Trump praised NRA leaders in a tweet saying “Wayne [LaPierre] Chris [Cox] and the folks who work so hard at the @NRA are Great People and Great American Patriots” while saying he believes they will “do the right thing” despite all evidence pointing directly to the opposite of that statement. Will Trump flip again? History says many times, but we’ll have to wait and see.
I’m a ceramic engineer living in Central New York, avid sports fan but find myself more interested in politics lately.