If you're a Twitchy reader, you know one of our favorite accounts is that of @Ian_McKelvey. He writes some great threads on important topics (that we've covered before), but he also likes to have fun with the Second Amendment. One of his ongoing trolls is to mock the left with tweets and threads about the damage that an AR-15 can do. Here are a couple of examples:
The destructive power of an AR-15 when fired from the air, at a ground-based target. These weapons of war have no place in a civilized society. https://t.co/yF9QW89Emx pic.twitter.com/GAeuAQa2LT
— Ian McKelvey (@ian_mckelvey) July 21, 2022
A stray bullet, fired from an AR-15, and it’s damaging effects. pic.twitter.com/fCo7fIzdtv
— Ian McKelvey (@ian_mckelvey) July 21, 2022
And if you are laughing as hard as we are right now, well, that's why you're a Twitchy reader.
But recently, we began to wonder if some of our most, ahem, 'esteemed' jurists -- SCOTUS justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown Jackson -- might have seen some of McKelvey's AR-15 threads and taken them a little too seriously.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Garland v. Cargill, wherein the government, under Attorney General Merrick Garland, is trying to ban bump stocks based on the claim that they turn semi-automatic weapons into automatic weapons (a.k.a. 'machine guns').
But throughout the hearing, what was revealed more than anything else was how ignorant Kagan, Sotomayor, and Jackson -- not to mention the government's attorney Brian Fletcher -- are about both bump stocks and guns in general.
Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan repeatedly insisted bump stock-equipped guns can fire up to 800 rounds a second. That’s false. https://t.co/rMwh3gmNtm
— So. AZ Cattlemen (@sacpaaz) February 29, 2024
For those unfamiliar with a bump stock, no, it does not create a 'machine gun.' They are simply casings that aid shooters with dexterity in engaging the trigger on a gun. They are generally intended to help people with disabilities operate a firearm, though anyone can own and use them.
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Yes, a bump stock-equipped gun can enable a faster rate of fire by allowing the operator to pull a trigger more rapidly, but it still results in one shot per trigger pull, unlike an automatic weapon. And no person can pull a trigger 800 times per second. Not even the Six Million Dollar Man. (OK, maybe The Flash could, if he was a real person and not a comic book character.)
The full transcript of the oral arguments is available from the SCOTUS website, but the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) also covered the live hearing in great detail yesterday on Twitter. The amount of firearm ignorance -- or outright lying from the government -- was truly astounding to behold.
BIG DAY FOR 2A!
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
The Garland v. Cargill Bumpstock Ban Lawsuit Oral Arguments with SCOTUS is happening live NOW!
You can listen live here: https://t.co/d3mN6APuDu pic.twitter.com/uP0Qeh7bH7
The government says that bump stocks allow you to shoot 600 times a second
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
In case you doubt the claim here in the FPC tweet, here is the text from the transcript of Fletcher's testimony:
Now, if you look at the videos that we cite in Footnote 1 of our reply brief, some of them are in slow motion, and they show that when the shooter is doing this, the hand is moving back and forth very fast, 600 times a second.
Fletcher later corrected himself to say he meant 600 times per minute but that is still pretty unrealistic. Justice Jackson later repeated this falsehood.
Justice Jackson says guns with bump stocks can fire 800 rounds a second
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
Again, Justice Jackson's exact words from the transcript:
The function of this trigger is to cause this kind of damage, 800 rounds a second or whatever.
You know, 'or whatever.' This is a Supreme Court justice?
Kagan and Sotomayor then followed up with a series of very incorrect perceptions of the function of bump stocks. We won't include the transcript entry for each of these, but they are accurate representations of what the justices said. You can check for yourself.
Justice Kagan says that with a bump stock, you can hold the trigger and bullets come out. Cargill says that's incorrect; bump stocks don't alter the trigger at all
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
[Michael Cargill is the respondent in this case and was represented by attorney Jonathan Mitchell]
Justice Sotomayor says that bump stocks allow you to fire automatically when you hold the trigger down. Cargill says that's incorrect yet again
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
Justice Kagan says that guns with bump stocks can unleash a torrent of bullets
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
Justice Kagan says bump stocks allow you to fire "a multitude of shots" with one action. Cargill says what matters is that only one round is fired for every function of the trigger
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
Justice Jackson is asking why the chemical reaction after the trigger is pulled isn't the single function that causes the gun to fire automatically. Like all of Jackson's other arguments, Cargill says that is also incorrect
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 28, 2024
We can't be sure who briefed the liberal justices on this case, but we think it might have been David Hogg.
The justices were also incorrect just in the very nature of magazines, in repeatedly talking about '800 rounds per second' (or per minute). One last relevant portion of the transcript:
JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: Why would even a person with arthritis, why would Congress think they needed to shoot 400 to 7 or 800 rounds of ammunition under any circumstance?
MR. MITCHELL: You can't choose --
JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: If you don't let a person without arthritis do that, why would you permit a person with arthritis to do it?
MR. MITCHELL: Well, they don't shoot 400 to 700 rounds because the magazine only goes up to 50. So you're still going to have to change the magazine.
Apparently, bump stocks also automatically eject and re-load magazines, according to the government and the liberal justices on the court.
Unbelievable.
Needless to say, Twitter had some fun with these outlandish claims from Fletcher, Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor.
I'll do the math for you...that's 36,000 rounds per minute.
— Dave📜 (@dbc603) February 28, 2024
The 20mm Vulcan gun *only* fires 3,000 rounds per minute. https://t.co/8oPjCMUng6 pic.twitter.com/csUaMjkc2e
Archival video of a bump stock in action https://t.co/MiOEokdy0u pic.twitter.com/Ahb4zBJcqM
— Aelfred The Great (@aelfred_D) February 28, 2024
The white dome is a bump stock. https://t.co/m1eaGOgmOn pic.twitter.com/iZyNWtPuNB
— Tandy (@dantypo) February 28, 2024
McKelvey would be proud of these replies, LOL.
Kagan knows as much about gunsmithing as Brown-Jackson does biology. https://t.co/aJvqUNkc2g
— Milo™ (@chasbottom) February 28, 2024
Justice Jackson is never going to live that down. Nor should she.
bump stocks make the bullets fatter and homophobic https://t.co/Vb2mONpsFr
— Jon Gabriel (@exjon) February 28, 2024
We can't lie. That one made us spit up our drink laughing a little bit.
GP Justice Sotomayor being incorrect (again) is like the sun rising in the east. Predictable af. https://t.co/gP2IOY6LsS
— The Gormogons (@Gormogons) February 28, 2024
These are the best and brightest legal minds???🥴 https://t.co/MLRnDmgq29
— George Wept (@GeorgeWept) February 28, 2024
That's a scary thought, isn't it?
If Garland v. Cargill is decided on the facts and the law, it would be an open-and-shut case in favor of the respondent. But since Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor (and Fletcher, let's not forget him) seem ignorant of the facts, we're not going to assume anything here.
The good news is, for the most part, the other justices on the court asked sober, informed, and probative questions on the matter of the law. Justice Gorsuch, for instance, asked the government why bump stocks should be outlawed now when they have been legal for decades. And Justice Kavanaugh asked questions about why previous administrations (including Obama's) did not consider bump stock-equipped weapons to be 'machine guns.'
The government didn't have many good answers to these types of questions.
But only time will tell how the Supreme Court rules. An opinion from the court is expected sometime this June.
***
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