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The National Instant Background Check System (NICS) numbers for March 2024 are significantly lower than March 2023. Gun sales for March this year, at 1.39 million, are 92% of last year’s, at 1.51 million. They are the lowest sales for March back to 2019. While this shows a drop in sales since the extraordinary sales levels in the election year of 2020, it is a relatively high number.The NICS check numbers are even lower. They are the lowest recorded for March since 2017. There is only a mild link between NICS checks and firearms sales, because NICS checks are used...

On Friday, April 26, 2024, Governor Bill Lee signed the popular school reform bill that would allow a few voluntary, highly regulated school staff to carry concealed firearms to protect the children under their care. The reform bill moves Tennessee from the few states that completely ban school staff from carrying concealed firearms to those states that allow staff to protect their children but with extreme restrictions. Most states have programs that are much less restrictive than the bill signed by Governor Lee. The bill, SB1325/HB1202, was popular in the state legislature, where it was passed with veto-proof majorities. The...

On March 8, 2024, the Florida legislature overwhelmingly voted for the HB0087: Taking of Bears. The Bill restores the ability of people in Florida to protect themselves, their pets, and dwellings from Florida black bears, which were administratively taken from them in 2012. The population of Florida black bears has skyrocketed, along with complaints and damage done by bears, particularly in Northern Florida.Florida legislative procedures require the governor to sign bills (after the legislature adjourns) within 15 days, or they become law without his signature. The timing starts when the governor receives the bill from the legislature.SECTION 8. Executive approval...

The lawsuit by the State of Texas, challenging the federal requirement to pay taxes and register homemade silencers, is moving forward in the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Oral arguments are scheduled for April 29, 2024. The case is now known as Paxton v Dettelbach. On February 24, 2022, Ken Paxton, the Texas Attorney General, filed suit against the acting head of the ATF, then Marvin Richardson. The lawsuit was required by Texas law. HB 957 became law in Texas on September 1, 2021. On July 15, 2022, Paxton, acting for the State of Texas, amended the lawsuit...

The oral arguments in the Paxton v Dettelbach case, will be heard at the Fifth Circuit Courthouse in New Orleans on Wednesday morning at 9:00. Texas AG Ken Paxton is challenging the power of the federal government to tax and require serial numbers on homemade silencers which are made and stay in Texas. The case is bolstered by the Bruen decision at the Supreme Court. Paxton says silencers are protected under the Second Amendment, the Tenth Amendment, and the Fourteenth Amendment, and there is no historical tradition requireing American citizens to serialize and pay a $200 tax to exercise their...

Attempting to quantify the effectiveness of defensive methods for use against bears suffers from significant selection bias. It is impractical to enlist large numbers of volunteers, randomly select half, give half a method of protection, leave the others as a control group, and place both in equal chances of being attacked. Instead, we rely on gathering data from people who were attacked and who had various types of defensive weapons. Obtaining a valid sample is nearly impossible because successful defenses have a strong bias of not being reported. The more spectacularly a defense fails, the more likely it is to...

The phrase “arming teachers” has standard meanings: To provide teachers with arms or to force teachers to carry arms. “Arming teachers” puts teachers in a passive role, with someone else “arming” them. It is being used to oppose a mild gun law reform bill in Tennessee.The phrase is being used in an Orwellian way by those opposed to an armed population. It is used by the left to prevent teachers from being allowed to protect themselves and the children in their care. The phrase “arming teachers” has become equated with removing restrictions on the ability of teachers to arm themselves....

I am doing research on bear attacks. A significant number happen on the Island of Hokkaido in Japan. The number of fatal attacks varies, usually between 0-4 in the last few years. I have numbers for 2018, 2019, and 2020. I need them for 2016, 2017, and 2021. Japanese authorities started tracking bear attacks a number of years ago, so the data is there. Finding it is the problem. Bear attacks in Japan are much better covered there than in the international press. Any help would be appreciated.

The other day, I was speaking to an Australian, attempting to explain to him how American Progressives view simple solutions to rampage school shootings, such as allowing armed military and police veterans to protect schools, as they do in Israel, to be “Off the table.”This hypothetical exchange between a “Naive Progressive” and an “Old Hand Progressive” was the result:Naive Progressive:I am concerned about Trump talking about allowing teachers with police and military experience to be armed to protect schools. Should we get ahead of this by adopting it as our policy, and requiring them to be highly regulated? Then they...

Border rancher George Allen Kelly, 75 years old, was on trial, charged with the death of an illegal alien who had been deported numerous times. The body of Gabriel Cuen Buitimea (48) had been found in the mesquite about 115 yards from the rural home of George Allen Kelly and his wife, Wanda. The husband and wife had retired to Arizona in 2002 after careers as a state fisheries biologist and a school teacher in Lincoln, Montana.On January 30, 2023, George Allen Kelly called Border Patrol and said he heard a shot and that he might have to return fire....

On April 18, 2024, the Supreme Court of Arkansas delivered a significant opinion impacting the restoration of the right to keep and bear arms. In particular, the court reaffirmed the right to bear arms is a fundamental constitutional right. The denial of the right is a harm that confers standing to those denied, and the procedural powers of the state judiciary, as a separate, constitutionally created branch of the state government, do not necessarily extend beyond the courtroom to the courthouse.The issue was whether Arkansas state statute § 5-73-122 – b, as modified in 2017, violated the Arkansas state constitution....

The Louisiana legislature is in the process of strengthening the current state preemption law regarding weapons and the right to keep and bear arms. Local governments seeking to push gun control have been clever about finding ways to restrict people’s right to keep and bear arms in ways not foreseen by previous preemption laws. For example, in Iowa, the Dubuque City Council voted to create a zoning ordinance to prohibit otherwise legitimate gun sales. In Montana, the city government of Missoula, dominated by the University of Montana, voted to require government approval of all firearm sales in the city. In...

ASPEN HILL, Md. (DC News Now) — A resident fired multiple gunshots during a burglary that took place early Thursday morning at the Peppertree Apartments in Aspen Hill. “I left the night before around eight or nine o’clock to go buy auto parts and then came back today just to see my home invaded,” resident Matthew James told DC News Now. At approximately 3 o’clock in the morning, Montgomery County Police Department (MCPD) officers responded to the report of a burglary at the 3200 block of Weeping Willow Ct. where James lives. According to James and MCPD, two unidentified adult...

On April 11, 2024, a lawsuit was filed against Rob Bonta in his capacity as the Attorney General of California. The lawsuit contends California infringes on the rights protected by the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights by prohibiting United States citizens who are non-residents of California from exercising rights protected by the Second Amendment in the state. 2. California, however, prevents law-abiding citizens of the United States who do not reside in California from exercising their constitutionally protected right to carry loaded, operable firearms in public. State law generally prohibits individuals from carrying firearms either openly or concealed...

The Department of Justice has issued a press release showing that, over five years, from January 1, 2017, to December 31, 2021, the number of firearms sold by unlicensed dealers in the USA was less than 1 of 10,000 sold in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). According to the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s adjusted calculations during the five-year period, the number of firearms sold through the NICS system was 14 million in 2017, 13.5 million in 2018, 13.6 million in 2019, 21.1 million in 2020, and 18.5 million in 2021, for a total of 80.7 million over...

A paper at the Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), founded by researcher John Lott, shows how faith in the police, arrest rates, and crime reporting are all interrelated. The paper is titled ” The Collapse in Law Enforcement: As Arrest Rates Plummet, People Have Been Less Willing to Report Crime,” published on April 5, 2024. As faith in the police collapses, reporting of crime drops, and so do arrest rates and clearance rates for both violent crimes and property crimes. This has the classic look of a positive feedback loop. The consequences are far from positive. It is not a...

LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. — The Lancaster County District Attorney's Office has determined a March 13 shooting on Fruitville Pike was justified. The shooting occurred at 4:22 p.m. near the intersection with Delp Road. Robin Megill was struck by a single round fired from a handgun, faced non-life-threatening injuries and is expected to make a full recovery. According to the Lancaster County DA's Office, Megill was riding a bike on Fruitville Pike in the lane of travel with multiple cars backed up behind him. A driver behind Megill reportedly beeped their horn. In response, Megill refused to exit the road and...

A man died and another was questioned after an argument between a woman's ex-boyfriend and her friend ended in gunfire Wednesday in a Hialeah neighborhood. Hialeah Police officials said officers responded to a call of a shooting in the 4000 block of West 13th Lane around 6:40 a.m. and found a man dead at the scene. Police spokesperson Eddie Rodriguez said the man who died, identified as 26-year-old Christian Rueda, arrived at his ex's place and saw another man leaving the house. "This is an ex-boyfriend (Rueda) that she’s had problems with in the past, restraining orders, stalking," Rodriguez said....

On February 15, 2024, a plea agreement was reached in the silencer case in the Western District of Louisiana. In the case, Brennan James Comeaux had been charged with possession of five homemade silencers, two silver-colored and three black-colored. A warrant had been issued to search Comeax’s home to find the silencers, based on probable cause. A motion to dismiss had been filed in the case, contending the portions of the National Firearms Act (NFA) and later statutes violated the Second Amendment of the Constitution based on the guidance of the Bruen decision published by the Supreme Court on June...

Over the course of a decade filled with political drama and dire predictions, Ohio legislators introduced seven separate bills in an attempt to bring concealed carry to Ohio.Finally, on Jan. 8, 2004, House Bill 12 made it to the desk of Gov. Bob Taft, who signed the bill, and made Ohio the 46th state to legalize concealed carry. The new law went into effect 20 years ago today, on April 8, 2004.Buckeye Firearms Association volunteers played a key role in this battle for constitutional rights, and stood beside the governor as he signed the bill into law.However, the battle over...