Attorney General Pam Bondi hasn't been quite what I'd hoped for when she was confirmed. As Florida attorney general, she vehemently defended the post-Parkland gun restrictions. She's dragged her feet on fulfilling the obligations of Trump's Second Amendment executive order. Her department is pushing an agenda that argues suppressors aren't "arms" under the Second Amendment. It's not great.
But she took a good step forward today.
In particular, she addressed a massive injustice that's been in place for decades.
On the surface, this doesn't look like a big deal. It's just a shifting of responsibility, moving the authority from the ATF to the Department of Justice.
Which, in a way, it is.
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But what makes this significant, is a single line of text in an amendment to a bill passed in 1992.
The system that allowed gun rights to be restored technically remained in place, there was just no money to do anything with it. As a result, people couldn't get their gun rights restored no matter how well they lived their lives or anything else.
Someone who made a stupid decision when they're 19 shouldn't be punished forever. In most other ways, we have a means in place for them to show that they have, in fact, reformed and shouldn't be treated as convicted felons going forward. This is a good thing. It's an enticement for those who have been convicted of a crime, something they can work toward knowing that they can redeem themselves in the eyes of the law.
It's not necessarily enough to eliminate recidivism, but it's still something.
Plus, when people keep their noses clean for a period of time, why shouldn't they get their gun rights back?
Interestingly, I expect to get outrage from the usual suspects, which will be humorous because these are also people wanting actual prison inmates to be able to vote, want to turn our jail cell doors into revolving ones, and generally take a pro-criminal outlook in every other aspect of, well, everything.
Why is it so good that they are back on the streets with virtually no punishment, but can't have a pathway to have their gun rights restored?
Bondi still has some ground to make up, to be sure. She has a lot of work to do if she wants gun rights supporters to have our trust, but this is not a bad first step in the least.
Now, step it up. We've got tons of other things that need to be addressed and only a couple of years to get it all done. Let's start with backing off on that suppressor thing, for starters, and we can go from there.
