O'Malley: 'Outrageous' That Paul Ryan Invokes Due Process Rights of Gun Buyers

December 3rd, 2015 11:47 AM

Maybe Martin O'Malley could come up with a list of all the constitutional rights which, as president, he would suspend. On Jose Diaz-Balart's MSNBC show today, discussing the rights of Americans to buy guns, O'Malley said "the very fact that Paul Ryan would start talking about due process and these sorts of issues, I mean I think is outrageous" in the wake of San Bernardino.

During an appearance earlier in the day on Morning Joe, Ryan had discussed the need to respect due process in the context of politicians, including President Obama, who complain that people on no-fly lists are not ipso facto prohibited from buying guns. Ryan pointed out that some people are placed on such lists mistakenly.

Diaz-Balart did not call O'Malley out on his disregard for the Constitution, but did somewhat skeptically ask what O'Malley could do to change things, given that all of the laws he spoke of having adopted as Maryland governor were already in place in California.

Ironic, no, that liberals like to rail about protecting the civil rights of criminals, terrorists included, but here O'Malley is quick to discard the Constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans?

My two cents: politics aside, there's something insufferable about O'Malley.

PAUL RYAN [on Morning Joe]: You have to also remember, there are law-abiding citizens whose rights we don't want to trample upon. People are saying, you know this no-fly list, don't let a person who's on a no-fly list get a gun. Well, there are people who are arbitrarily place on this things. Sometimes people are put on there by mistake. And we would deprive them of their Constitutionally-protected due process rights. So we have to make sure that we're not violating a person's civil liberties or their rights, while we make sure that we prosecute and enforce the laws. 

MARTIN O'MALLEY: This may well be an act of domestic terrorism, but it's also one made easier by the fact that we're the only developed nation on the planet that doesn't do a damn thing to keep combat assault weapons out of the hands of those who should not be able to get them. I mean, the very fact that Paul Ryan would start talking about due process and these sorts of issues, I mean I think is outrageous in the wake of something like this. 

JOSE DIAZ-BALART: Governor, what exactly could you do as President of the United States to change things? I'm in California where all of the restrictions you passed in your state are even stronger here and yet here is where we have seen this horrible tragedy just a couple of yards behind me.