On September 5, 2019, Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke promised to confiscate semi-automatic firearms from law-abiding Americans if he is elected as president.
The presidential candidate made his anti-gun statement on the campaign trail in Charlottesville, Virginia.
O’Rourke was confronted by a reporter who asked him how he plans to address voters’ fears that his gun control platform involves gun confiscation.
O’Rourke did not pull any punches:
I want to be really clear, that’s exactly what we are going to do. Americans who own [semi-automatic firearms] will have to sell them to the government.
The former Texas congressman has languished in the polls ever since his failed Senate run in 2018. He has generally hovered around the 2 percent range. O’Rourke has exploited the El Paso shooting in August as a way to reignite his campaign but there has been no indication that it is helping him in the polls.
Although O’Rourke’s campaign is likely on its last legs, his ideas will live on in the increasingly radicalized Democratic Party.
Radical gun control is an official policy plank of the Democratic Party, which should make gun owners steer clear of that party at the ballot box. Sadly, most options on the Republican side aisle don’t offer much of an ideological alternative either.
