Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke continued to say that anyone who does not turn in the types of rifles that would be banned if he becomes president, will be criminally charged and the gun will be taken away.
“Anyone who does not and is caught in possession or seen in possession of one of these weapons of war, one of these instruments of terror, that weapon will be taken from them and they will be fined. And if they should persist in continuing to — to use and to buy these weapons then there will be other consequences in the criminal code," O'Rourke told CBS News.
The former Texas congressman maintained he expects gun owners to turn in their AR-15s and similar types of rifles. He was asked where the funding would come from in order for the government to pay for the rifles.
“I think a mandatory buyback can be financed with a surcharge that would be paid by gun manufacturers, those who are making the AR-15s and AK-47s, and continue to sell them into our communities despite the terror that they’ve inspired and the lives that they’ve been taken," O'Rourke explained. "I think this is — is the right way to fund a mandatory buyback, without imposing any new taxes on our fellow Americans.”
O'Rourke has stayed the course on his mandatory compensated confiscation of AR-15s despite large amounts of backlash. The idea has gotten blowback from sheriffs and law enforcement organizations to the point where they say they will not enforce such a law.
"I'm not sure whether his statements are naive or just plain ignorant and arrogant. Maybe it's all three," Eddy County Sheriff Mark Cagen recently told Townhall. "The thought of anyone utilizing my sheriff's office or any other law enforcement agency in this country as their personal Gestapo to go door to door violating citizen's rights is disgusting, unrealistic and downright un-American."