Florida leaders want to remove requirements to register and get a permit to carry a concealed weapon. In the ideal libertarian state, there would be no gun control at all. More murders, more killing. Does Florida have a minimum age requirement? That will be next to go.
Florida House Speaker Paul Renner is pushing a measure that would allow people to carry concealed firearms without a permit and without training, saying he wants to remove the “government permission slip.”
Renner had previously said that he wanted a permitless carry bill — something Gov. Ron DeSantis has also advocated for — during this year’s legislative session, which starts March 7.
He announced the legislation during a news conference Monday, surrounded by the bill’s sponsors and Florida sheriffs.
Standing alongside Renner, Hernando County Sheriff Al Nienhuis, president of the Florida Sheriff’s Association, endorsed the legislation. “I think we can assume that our citizens are gonna do the right thing when it comes to carrying and bearing arms,” he said.
Twenty-five states already have what supporters call “constitutional carry” measures, meaning they don’t require a permit to carry a concealed firearm.
Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article271838402.html#storylink=cpy
However, gun lovers complained that the proposed bill doesn’t go far enough. They want every Floridian to be able to carry their gun in the open. They call it “constitutional carry,” because the Constitution doesn’t say anything about background checks, training or any of the other requirements sought or imposed by gun control advocates.
The red states are competing, it seems, to see who can go farthest to erase any limits on gun ownership and use.
The opposition to Florida’s proposed legislation to allow Floridians to carry concealed firearms without a permit or training was expected from gun safety advocates.
But at a Tuesday hearing on the bill, there were just as many disgruntled Second Amendment supporters, who said the bill didn’t go far enough because it doesn’t allow for open carry, the visible carrying of a firearm.
Only a few of the dozens of public commenters told legislators they were happy with the measure as written.
But Republican members of the House Constitutional Rights, Rule of Law & Government Operations Subcommittee passed the bill out of the committee on a 10-5 vote along party lines.
The bill now only has one other committee hearing to move through before it goes to a vote on the House floor. House Speaker Paul Renner has expressed strong support for the bill, holding a news conference last month with uniformed sheriffs to announce its filing.
Senate President Kathleen Passidomo has also expressed her support for the measure, though no matching legislation has yet been filed in the Senate. Sen. Jay Collins, R-Tampa, has said he will be the bill’s sponsor.
‘CONSTITUTIONAL CARRY’ IN PLAY
Permitless carry, often called constitutional carry by supporters, allows people within certain legal parameters to carry weapons without having to go through the permitting process.
In Florida, that includes a background check, fingerprinting, a payment of $97 for a new application and the completion of a training course, which includes firing a live round in front of an instructor. Gun carriers would be required to carry a personal ID.
Some of those gun rights advocates said Florida’s proposal is not true “constitutional carry” because it applies only to people being able to carry a concealed weapon; it doesn’t permit open carry of weapons in public and still restricts gun possession for people under the age of 21 and on college campuses.
“To call this bill constitutional carry is an insult to our intelligence,” said Bob White, the chairman of the Republican Liberty Caucus of Florida. Luis Valdes, Florida director of Gun Owners of America, said the bill is a step in the right direction compared to prior years when similar bills didn’t make it out of committees.
But he said it doesn’t go far enough. “The governor has pledged he wants constitutional carry, he didn’t pledge that he wants permitless concealed only,” Valdes said.
Should there be any age limit for purchasing or owning or carrying guns? Is 10 years old okay? How about 6? Should guns be okay in schools? How about in the legislature? Why not let prisoners carry guns? Why should they lose their “constitutional rights”?
Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article272248473.html#storylink=cpy
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“Standing alongside Renner, Hernando County Sheriff Al Nienhuis, president of the Florida Sheriff’s Association, endorsed the legislation. “I think we can assume that our citizens are gonna do the right thing when it comes to carrying and bearing arms,” he said.”
“Do the right thing” Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ad infinitum.
Assume, v: to make an ass of you and me’
When did the ethics of owning and using a firearm change so dramatically that it is considered okay to carry a loaded weapon in public?
When Repugnican legislators decided they were Virgil Earp and the year was 1881.
Yee hoo, yee haw. We needs tuh organerize uh citisins malisher to go after them Socialists en carervans of rappists en murdering varmints!
For a long time now, Rhonda Santis has pledged to institute open carry in Flor-uh-duh before he leaves office.
Perhaps even sicker and more anti-life, from The Guardian: “Missouri Votes Against Banning Children from Carrying Guns in Public,” with subheadline “Republican-led legislature rejects measure to prevent minors from carrying firearms without adult supervision.”
If’n the revenurers shows up, Little Tommy needs to be able to grab a sawed off en difend the fambly!
I fear that Little Tommy will soon belong to a state-funded Well-Regulated, Self-Regulated Youth Militia.
Yeah, I have the same fear, Bill.
Give them a gun, but take away their books. That’s messed up, by design.
yup
As always, we need to distinguish Corporate Libertarians (who want to free corporations to do anything they damn well please) from Real Libertarians (a species already extinct for all practical purposes).
And we need to distinguish both from librarians (corporate or otherwise)
I’d take the worst corporate librarian over a real libertarian any day of the week.
I wonder if Dangerously Deranged DeSantis is doing this to make it easier for him to pull off a violent coup when he makes his better organized coup attempt.
Yes, I was Trump’s shill.
Yes, I wrote THAT bill.
Going for the weak among us
gives me a thrill.
A do run, Rhonda Santis. Do run, Ron.
This is absolutely terrifying. Florida is already an angry, violence-prone place and adding more guns will make this even more dangerous. I launched my kayak at a small launch in a somewhat remote area of the St. John’s River yesterday, and when I returned there were numerous folks all sporting some type of “f**k Biden” and pro Trump and pro gun paraphernalia. The Trump flag with the crossed AR15s flying summed them up. Most of them were sporting sidearms. Will not be returning to that area, as beautiful as the nature is out there. There is a whole lot of craziness and violence here, it doesn’t need more.
They may have been a little over-excited, but were only there to protect public safety by killing alligators and other dangerous wildlife. For example, manatees are very heavy and can kill you if they roll over on you.
These Trumpanzees ARE the dangerous wildlife.
Hilarious, Mark!
The alligators are protected except for a brief hunting season, people not so much. Florida, where the gators have more rights than the people.
I was recently working on a stage set for a local theatre troupe. I was standing backstage, and a local resident was hanging lights. He was way up a ladder when the gun he was carrying fell out of his back pocket and clattered on the stage far below.
This is what we have to live with here. It’s frightening.
But it was the same when I lived in New Hampshire. I LOVED hiking in the woods, but there were always idiots out there shooting at any random movement. One of these moronic “sportsmen” shot and killed an elderly woman who was in her yard, tending to her flower garden. The judge ruled in the murderer’s favor and commented that she shouldn’t have been warning white gloves during deer hunting season.
idiots
Here in FL we have a number of car robberies, mostly because some people are hunting for guns inside of cars and trucks. Also, some of them leave their guns in unlocked cars!
yup
Many years ago, in a strongly Democratic state, my son and a new friend (both around 12 at the time) were cruising around our small, well-to-do town on their bikes. They decided to stop at the friend’s house for water. No adults were home.
The friend was excited to show my son where his father kept his loaded pistol– in a desk drawer! My son told me the friend only opened the drawer, and neither of them touched the gun.
I later told the father about my concern, and he said, “My son understands gun safety and knows he is not to touch the gun.” This father was a pillar of the community, hard working, a longtime volunteer fireman, and active in many charities and his church. (So my mind was put at ease!?)
Another idiot. I woman I knew a few years ago bought a gun “for protection.” She hid it in a box under her be. Her fourteen-year-old son, her only child, blew his brains out with it.
under her bed
ANOTHER incident (they just go on and on…). 11 years ago:
“Arizona state Sen. Lori Klein (R), a gun-rights champion, keeps a loaded raspberry-pink handgun in her purse, and during an interview with Arizona Republic reporter Richard Ruelas, she took it out and pointed it at him.
“Oh, it’s so cute,” Klein said, before aiming the gun at Ruelas’s chest to show off the red beam of the laser sight. Klein’s gun, a .380 Ruger, has no safety, but the senator assured Ruelas that he wasn’t in danger.
“I just didn’t have my hand on the trigger,” she said.
Klein told the Arizona Republic that she owns a number of guns and has had “informal” training sessions on each of them, and that she was taught gun safety by her father.
Lori Klein has no ethical business carrying a firearm considering that stunt. She should have to do some jail time and have all her weapons confiscated.
under her bed”
Thanks for clarifying , Bob
I was trying to figure out how she could hide a gun under a 🐝
It would either have to be a very small gun or a very large 🐝
Bee-zilla
And if she had a 🐝 large enough to hide a gun under, she wouldn’t even need a gun.
When they start producing 🐝’s that large, 🐝 afraid. 🐝 very afraid.
By the way, what do you call a genetically modified giant killer 🐝?
A drone.
Giant Killer 🐝’s
The giant killer bees
To take the place of guns
Will bring them to their knees
The muggers and the nuns
A year ago a young high schooler did the same thing in the next town over from us, Guilford CT, a very affluent town of educated people. The result ruined a number of lives when the kid picked up his father’s gun to show it to the other kid and it went off, shooting him in the head. Lock the damn things up!!
Look at the facts and salute the wisdom of the Constitution! We’ve already had one teacher shot by a 6 year old in school. Get your gun!! Be prepared to stop those kids before they stop us!
Haaaaa!
More insanity.
There’s really only one reason for “open carry”: Intimidation. Open carry enthusiasts just love to make their unarmed fellow citizens know who’s boss. Namely, any insecure yahoo who wants to at best unsettle and at worst terrify those who neither feel the need to pack heat nor treasure the thrill of scaring their neighbors.
Know why the Gunfight at the OK Corral happened? The Clanton gang defied the law by being armed within the Tombstone town limits. In the “Wild West”, towns routinely banned the carrying of firearms within town limits. (That was also the first law passed in Dodge City).
Today’s gun nuts are nothing less than a death cult. We’ve seen what this leads to. We don’t seem to care.
“There’s really only one reason for “open carry”: Intimidation.”
No, there is no reason to open carry, even for the police.
And that’s coming from a gun owner and user, from one who was taught how to properly handle a weapon. Properly handling a weapon does not include open carry.
The gunnutshitheads, lead by the NRA, yes I was a member for a couple of years back in the late 70s-early 80s until I realized just how foul an organization that it is, should be banned from owning firearms if they ever carry a firearm in public without the proper precautions which is to have the weapon broken down and cased so that it can’t be fired and no ammunition is available to use. Break that basic safety rule and you lose your weapon privileges.
Duane, you know that safety laws won’t pass.
No doubt that it won’t happen. That doesn’t prevent an individual gun owner from doing the right thing (and the majority do the right thing).
As I’ve stated before, it baffles me why anyone would think that carrying a loaded weapon in public, whether concealed or open is beyond my ken. And I include law enforcement in not carrying a loaded weapon.
Well said. A death cult.
“Inside the Sick Arrogance of Rocky Mountain Gun Owners” (Colorado Pols, 2-9-2023). At the Colorado capitol, testimony related to gun law was given by RMGO’s representative. The allegation is that RMGO described Black children being killed by guns as gangland violence. But, gun deaths among other children of other races was set up as a separate issue.
Add that to Pat Robertson’s reported fear that Black people will get a whip handle and instruct White neighbors how to behave and we can assess
motivation for laws like ALEC’s Stand Your Ground.
RMGO is a gang of thugs. They ARE the problem.
Romney should expand his horizon and recognize Santos is part of a majority – Republican sick puppies.
I remember not too long ago attending legislative sessions in Tallahassee. The Education Committee, led by Chair Legg, (he hated when called that, his wife was a charter school operator) was saying how FL public schools were graduating students who lacked critical thinking skills to demonize public education. In the next room over, the GOP was debating expanding gun rights to FL citizens, claiming Floridians were smart enough to be able to possess a deadly weapon and determine when to use deadly force in Stand Your Ground. You can’t make this shit up.
Woke AF Teacher,
Brilliant observation.
I had a farming buddy one time caught a groundhog eatin up his soybeans. He put his old Allis-Chalmers up into road gear and bore down on that rascal. Bout the time he got close that ole groundhog lot out for his hole, so my buddy picked up his 12 inch crescent wrench and beaned that groundhog. Ida never have believed it without he told me.
So I figure it’s time for crescent wrench open carry. I figure my old 20 inch would have made the medieval arsenal. If Charles Martel haduhad one uvem, Heda drove them Scarcen back to Tunis.
Was it a bolt action crescent wrench?
Or 🚗 matic?
“ … the Constitution doesn’t say anything about background checks …”
The Constitution doesn’t say anything about driver’s licenses, auto insurance. Or even—I haven’t checked—birth certificates? Yet DJT and birthers clamored for Obama’s.
There’s a lot in our world that isn’t directly specified in US Constitution.