Always one to mangle the facts and explain away her anti-Semitism, homophobia, and racism, MSNBC’s ReidOut host Joy Reid offered a torrent of lies about the Second Amendment as she lobbied for “gun reform,” claimed “it’s easier to buy a gun than it is to vote,” and called the right’s support for gun rights part of “an Alex Jones-ificiation” of the GOP.
Reid’s biggest lie came during an interview with Pennsylvania AG Josh Shapiro when she demanded Senate Democrats should ax the filibuster to enact wide-sweeping measures because that there’s nothing in the text of the Second Amendment that would render their proposals unconstitutional.
Her reasoning? Reid asserted that “[t]he text of the Second Amendment includes the word ‘well regulated’ and it talks about militias,” so “[i]t is irrelevant to gun reform from what, you know, is being talked about in places like — in Congress and in the United States and in the House.”
By Reid’s logic, even things like gun confiscation schemes would be constitutional. But to the surprise of absolutely no one, the facts aren’t on her side.
In D.C. v. Heller (2008), the Supreme Court found that the Second Amendment does ensure a person’s right to keep and bear arms for self-defense and that it’s unrelated to whether they served in the military. Two years later in the McDonald case, the Court extended that right against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment as it struck down a handgun ban in Chicago.
Though that in of itself could have been a blog, there were more lies to highlight.
At the top of the show, Reid peddled the widespread lie that it’s easier for someone (regardless of whether they’re a criminal) to obtain a gun than for anyone to vote:
Now, of course, we know the story all too well. We have seen it on our television far too many times. We’ve mourned the lives lost, feeling outrage over the lack of action, while knowing in some parts of the country it's easier to buy a gun than it is to vote. And now, Congress looks and feels very different, boasting gun-obsessed conservatives who display their weapons as their Zoom backgrounds, and campaign as Second Amendment warriors. This is what we’re up against.
Townhall’s Beth Baumann wrote an excellent takedown of this narrative when Senator Alex Padilla (D-CA) uttered it, so we’ll highlight her section on background checks as, spoiler alert, one cannot simply walk into a gun shop, pick up a gun, pay, and walk out in, say, five minutes (click “expand”):
Whenever a person goes to a Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL) – commonly referred to as a "gun dealer" – the buyer is legally required to fill out a 4473 form so a background check can be completed. That is required for every single gun sale that takes place between a gun dealer and a purchaser.
What Padilla is referring to is Private Party Transfers (PPTs). That is when two average citizens decide to buy and sell guns to one another. It can also be when a person gifts a firearm to another family member. There are laws on the books regulating PPTs. Two private parties can transfer firearms to one another without going through an FFL "provided the transferor does not know or have reasonable cause to believe the transferee is prohibited from receiving or possessing firearms under federal law." In some states, like Padilla's home state of California, all PPTs must be done through an FFL, which is essentially a way for the Department of Justice to keep tabs on all guns. It creates a registry, which could later be used down the road for confiscation purposes. And it's why pro-gun supporters take issue with registries.
Washington Free Beacon writer (and former MRCTV editor) Stephen Gutowski put together a PowerPoint presentation on misconceptions about firearms, including background checks, “interstate handgun sales,” and so-called loopholes.
Reid also repeatedly cited an “assault weapons ban” as an example of something that could prevent future mass shootings. But as our friend Katie Pavlich wrote in a Townhall fact-check, it’s so simple as leftists have claimed.
In one other stunning moment, Reid complained to Colorado State Senator Rhonda Fields (D) that while she “always knew lots of people have guns” and didn’t think it was “a, you know, wacky-league gun state when I was growing up, but it is.”
Asking “what in the hell is going on in Colorado,” Fields lamented that she didn’t have an answer “because we have some very strong gun safety measures in the state of Colorado, but we have people committing homicide and suicide with these assault weapons.”
Ah, so despite a state having some of the strictest gun control measures in the country, violence still occurs? Who knew!
And finally, we come to Reid’s annoyance that those dirty, racist, and all-white (since she doesn’t think Tim Scott is Black) conservatives still oppose “pretty common sense” “gun reform” even though “the NRA is weakened” and “crippled.”
The rationalizations were all over the place, ranging from insisting the NRA “still seem[s] to exert so much control over Republican politicians” to a guest saying it’s part of the GOP turning into “a Twitter troll operation” to Reid’s insane belief that “it's sort of been an Alex Jones-ification, right, of the Republican Party.”
With that Mount Everest-sized strawman constructed, Reid invoked Congresswoman Lauren Boebert (R-CO) having guns mounted behind her during a virtual House committee hearing as proof that those who support guns don’t belong in politics because they’re “hurting the effort” to keep people safe.
This might come as a shock to the perpetually venomous Reid, but it might be because people from coast-to-coast and of all backgrounds believe and recognize America’s unique responsibility for her citizens to keep and bear arms to protect their families, themselves, and their loved ones.
As our friends at the Heritage Foundation found, guns are used in self-defense anywhere from 500,000 to three million times in a given year and that “concealed carry permit holders are not the problem,” but in both cases, Reid and her pals don’t seem to care.
Joy Reid’s ignorance of the Constitution and venom for people who disagree with her was supported with the endorsement of advertisers such as ADT and Clear Choice. Follow the links to see their contact information at the MRC’s Conservatives Fight Back page.
To see the relevant MSNBC transcript from March 23, click “expand.”
MSNBC’s The ReidOut
March 23, 2021
7:02 p.m. EasternJOY REID: But here we are tonight, asking again with new urgency, whether this country will ever again address the unique, American problem of gun violence. And once again, it boils down to action.
[BLUMENTHAL AND DURBIN CLIPS]
REID: Now, of course, we know the story all too well. We have seen it on our television far too many times. We’ve mourned the lives lost, feeling outrage over the lack of action, while knowing in some parts of the country it's easier to buy a gun than it is to vote. And now, Congress looks and feels very different, boasting gun-obsessed conservatives who display their weapons as their Zoom backgrounds, and campaign as Second Amendment warriors. This is what we’re up against. So we ask — and as we’ve asked each and every time this happens, when will this end? [INTRODUCES PANEL] I want to start with you, State Representative Fields. I grew up in Colorado. I always knew lots of people have guns.
STATE SENATOR RHONDA FIELDS (D): Yes.
REID: We, you know, Columbine happened. There have been all of these incidents — the Aurora night club shootings [sic], Colorado’s a gunny state. It didn't seem like a, you know, wacky-league gun state when I was growing up, but it is. There’s a — there’s an analysis that shows — in 2019, Denver Post did an analysis that shows Colorado — my growing up state — has had more mass shootings per capita than all but four states in the country.
FIELDS: Right.
REID: The census-designated Denver metropolitan statistical area had more shootings per capita since 1999 than any of the other country's 24 other largest metro areas. What in the hell is going on in Colorado?
FIELDS: I wish I knew. I really wish I knew what was really going on because we have some very strong gun safety measures in the state of Colorado, but we have people committing homicide and suicide with these assault weapons, and guns and rifles and whatever they can get their hands on.
REID: And, well, I changed — I changed which house you're in, our a state senator. So, I apologize for that, senator.
FIELD: Thank you.
REID: Just to ask you, so, there was actually a assault weapons ban. You know, Colorado actually did — was kind of proactive after some of these mass school shootings and passed some laws, including an assault weapons ban. It was supposed to stop mass shootings. It was blocked ten days before this particular attack. Not that it necessarily would have stopped it. A judge ruled that Boulder could not enforce the 2018 ban on assault-style weapons and large capacity magazines that was put in place following the Parkland school shooting. The judge said the city could not restrict arms that are otherwise legal under state and federal law. Is there a — a tact or a reverse of what had been pretty good — a pretty good record for the state of Colorado on trying to pass gun control.
FIELDS: Right. In fact, we do have an assault weapons ban in Denver, so the mayor and the city council has an assault weapons ban, but it's a patched approach. So, all across Colorado, it’s not the same. And the same across our nation. We can have people go across borders and — and buy these assault weapons. And we need, really, like the congress people were talking, for people to catch up with what's going on in our communities. It's time for Congress to act.
REID: Let’s — yeah. A federal solution seems like it is called for. Brandon, my friend, thank you for being here. I want you to, you know, President Biden said it shouldn't be a political issue, but of course it is. Of course it is and let me just let you listen to some of the senators during today’s gun violence hearing. Some of the Republicans.
[CRUZ AND KENNEDY CLIPS]
REID: That – that’s dumb. John — Senator John Kennedy got $215,000 from NRA. Ted Cruz has got $176,000 — $274,000 in recent cycles. Brandon, the NRA is weakened. They’re, like, crippled. Why do they still seem to exert so much control over Republican politicians?
BRANDON WOLF: Well, I don't even know in that's the answer anymore. I think Republican politicians have sold themselves out to the farthest right wing of their party and they essentially function as a Twitter troll operation. I want to tell your viewers a quick story, actually. In 2019, I became the first survivor of the Pulse Nightclub shooting to testify before a committee. It was chaired by late Congressman John Lewis and I was very, very honored to — to share my story there. I poured my heart out. I told parts of that story that had been previously way too hard for me to share, because this is a matter of life and death. I felt it that important to share. And after I left it all the off table, the ranking Republican member of that committee had the audacity to say to me, rather than ask members of Congress what they can do, what are you doing to make your own community safer? Well, the truth is that I took that to heart. I home and I worked tireless to give Democrats control of Congress in 2020. And I tell you that, because I'm not going to play the phony outrage game with Republican lawmakers who would sooner see our democracy overthrown than someone have to pass a background check for a gun they bought online. It is far past time for American to move forward. Republican legislators can join the majority of their constituents in that work whenever their ready, but so long as they're intent on stomping their feet and obstructing progress and — and looking for the next viral tweet, then we’re just going to have to it without them.
REID: Yeah, you know, and it's sort of been an Alex Jones-ification, right, of the Republican Party, Senator. I mean, you’ve got Lauren Boebert, who uses, like, a bunch of big old guns as her Zoom background and she tweeted out today, “thoughts and prayers” for the — on the shooting and got this [INAUDIBLE] by Jemele Hill because, it’s like, you — you did do that background. Is — is somebody like her in politics in Colorado hurting the effort?
FIELDS: Absolutely. It's not helpful at all. And we definitely need federal leadership. I mean, Colorado has done some great things, but we need to make sure that Congress is acting right now. In the state of Colorado, after Columbine, we closed the gun show loophole. We have universal background checks, we have two pieces of legislation that is making its way through the chambers, which is gun safe storage. Also how to report a stolen gun. So, we’re still working on things, but I do think that, at some point, we need to ban assault weapons.
REID: That seems logical. Colorado State Senator Rhonda Fields, Brandon Wolfe, I wish we had more time. Thank for you both being here. And with us now is the Pennsylvania Attorney General, Josh Shapiro. And, you know, you’re — you’re trying. The state of Pennsylvania is trying to do something to sort of get rid of these, like ghost guns, guns that you have to put together afterwards, so you can get around the loopholes, you know, for background checks — checks, etc. You know, is it — is it going to be — we just heard the state senator from Colorado say the state is trying to pass things — is this still going to come down to the states doing all the work here on gun reform?
[SHAPIRO]
REID: You know, you know — part of your job — I mean, it is a political job. Can you just explain what could be — and have you talked — I don't know, with the senators, with people like Pat Toomey and other Republicans — what is their justification now? The NRA is basically crippled. They’re broke. They're trying to reassemble themselves in Texas. But they don't wield the kind of power that they used to. Can you explain, or do you understand what the objection is to something like what you just said, which seems pretty common sense?
[SHAPIRO]
REID: You know, the NRA tried to tweet out today, thinking they were dropping the mic, tweeting out the text of the second amendment. The text of the Second Amendment includes the word “well regulated” and it talks about militias. It is irrelevant to gun reform from what, you know, is being talked about in places like — in Congress and in the United States and in the House. Would you like to see the United States Senate get rid of the filibuster in order to pass what, like, even 70 percent of Republicans want universal background checks? Do you think the Senate should just — dead the filibuster so that they can actually pass it?
JOSH SHAPIRO: If you're telling me that the inaction that is causing the loss of life every single day in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania can be fixed by doing away with the filibuster, then hell yeah, do away with the filibuster. It's a vestige of a Senate from yesteryear that has rendered it unable to solve the big, pressing problems of the day. We need to get these ghost guns and these other weapons of war out of the hands of criminals. We should all agree on that and if the filibuster is the thing that’s holding it up, then let's get rid of that filibuster immediately.
