On December 18, the Ohio State Senate voted overwhelmingly to send amended Senate Bill 58 to Governor Mike DeWine’s desk to sign into law. SB 58, moving forward with a voting margin of 25-6, would prohibit any government entity in Ohio from requiring citizens to acquire firearm liability insurance or pay a fee to exercise their Constitutional rights to possess a firearm, component, ammunition or knife. Senate Bill 148, in the meantime, was amended into SB 58 and protects the privacy of Ohioans by prohibiting the government from maintaining registries of firearms or firearm owners and forbidding financial institutions from tracking firearms purchases.
The Buckeye Firearms Association (BFA) has supported SB 58 and SB 148, sponsored by Senator Terry Johnson, from the onset of the legislative session, with Senator Theresa Gavarone joining Johnson on SB 58. The group testified in the State House and Senate supporting both bills and is now urging Governor DeWine to sign them into law immediately.
“Opponents of our Second Amendment rights are an inventive lot, continually seeking ways to get around constitutional protections to prohibit or restrict firearms possession and ownership…
But while some opponents of firearms rights seek to outright ban differing types of firearms and equipment, others take a more insidious approach by usurping our rights through government intervention such as attempts to levy taxes on individual rounds of ammunition,” said Rob Sexton, Legislative Affairs Director for Buckeye Firearms Association, in support of SB 58.
Standing firm on the belief that it’s time to stop punishing law-abiding gun owners by infringing upon their rights and instead focus resources on criminal activity, Sexton outlined similar efforts to quell the rights of Americans living in California, Connecticut, and New York, testifying to the importance of preempting such efforts in Ohio.
“…as is too often the case with gun control activists, this type of requirement transfers the penalty for violence from the criminal to the law abiding, making people who simply want to protect their families and loved ones, foot the bill for those who wouldn’t buy this insurance product… Understanding the nature of activist courts and these backdoor attempts to steal Second Amendment rights to protect ourselves allows the Ohio General Assembly to get ahead of these efforts and bar the door against them,” said Sexton.
In later testimony, Sexton explained that SB 148 would not only protect the privacy of citizens but it would also prevent a system from being put in place that could not accurately account for firearms-related purchases anyway and may, in fact, place undue prejudice on smaller businesses while glossing over purchases made at major retailers.
“Coding purchases from firearm retailers is a gross invasion of privacy concerning a constitutionally protected right… It is also an imprecise method of compiling information. Most firearm retailers also sell items unrelated to firearms such as other sporting goods and even clothing. All of these would still be coded as a purchase from a gun dealer. Conversely firearms sold at a major big box department store such as Walmart would not be coded as a purchase from a firearm retailer,” Sexton testified in support of SB 148.
The bills represent crucial efforts to counter gun control advocates who seek to strain Americans’ Second Amendment rights by driving up the cost of firearm ownership while stripping them of their privacy in what can only be described as an attempt to intimidate those who choose to exercise their Constitutional liberties.
