Failed Democratic gubernatorial candidate Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke has switched positions on gun control – just not in the way you might hope.
Rather than grandfathering current owners of certain rifles into new legislation that would ban the sale of AR-15s and other semi-automatic firearms, O’Rourke now says he supports the government seizure of so-called “assault rifles” from the millions of Americans who already legally own them.
“Not only should no one be able to purchase an AR-15 or an AK-47, because they’re designed to kill humans…but I don’t think that the people who have them right now in civilian use should be able to keep them,” O’Rourke said this week at a town hall, a week after a gunman in Uvalde, Texas killed 19 children and two teachers in an elementary school classroom.
Beto O’Rourke unambiguously endorses government mandated gun confiscation. pic.twitter.com/NgRoWZzBRD
— Arthur Schwartz (@ArthurSchwartz) May 31, 2022
That stance differs from the position O'Rourke had previously stated as late as February of this year, when he said, “I’m not interested in taking anything from anyone. What I want to make sure that we do is defend the Second Amendment," while also calling for a ban on all future sales of AR-style rifles.
There are currently around 20 million AR-15s in circulation across the United States, the overwhelming majority in the hands of law-abiding gun owners.