CBS News on National Reciprocity: Flyover Country’s ‘Security Blanket’ Could Become Coastal Cities’ Nightmare

During the February 11 airing of 60 Minutes, CBS News described guns as a flyover county “security blanket” that could become coastal cities’ worst nightmare.

National reciprocity passed the House on December 6, 2017, and the CBS News warns that passage in the Senate would mandate that the carry permit of any one state be recognized in every state. They turned to Robyn Thomas, with Gabby Giffords’ gun control group, and Thomas said, “Someone who lives in Nevada, who’s able to carry a loaded, concealed weapon in Nevada could now bring that loaded gun into Los Angeles, into San Francisco, and carry their loaded weapon, even though in San Francisco that’s not someone who would get a permit.”

Thomas’ statement gives the impression that national reciprocity allows people to carry who otherwise would not be able to do so. But this is a play on words. In reality, individuals who passed a background check to acquire a permit in Nevada have demonstrated they are legally able to carry. The reason they might not get a permit in San Francisco is because of gun control, not because of failing to show a clean criminal record.

California is actually a perfect example for why national reciprocity is needed, because law-abiding Californians who demonstrate a lack of criminal record are nonetheless denied a concealed carry permit on grounds that they cannot show “good cause” for having one. (In other words, being law-abiding is not enough. In California you have to persuade the local sheriff that you are under duress, facing danger if unarmed.)

Yet CBS News described guns as a “security blanket” for the hayseeds in flyover country:

In the red states that stretch from the Carolinas through the mountains of the far west. It is the political fault line of regional and cultural differences that split the country and guns are one of the triggers. They’re woven into the culture here, passed down from generation to generation in rural, remote parts of the country where dialing 911 does not always bring immediate help. To people here, whether they’re single mothers worried about robbers and rapists while driving their kids across state lines to soccer matches, or ranchers worried about rattlesnakes, guns are a security blanket of self-reliance and protection that keep them safe.

So tools that allow single mothers to fend off “robbers and rapists” in rural America somehow portend a rise in crime if carried into big cities and blue states?

In reality, national reciprocity only poses a threat to the top-down gun control that currently keeps visitors to blue states and big cities disarmed.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.