Donald Trump says he backs the 2nd Amendment, but ‘Bad things are happening out there which we need to look into.’
New York — GOP presidential hopeful Donald Trump said at a press conference Friday that the government should expand gun rights, focus more on violent criminals, and ensure that guns don’t fall into the hands of the mentally ill.
Introducing his new “Position Paper on the Second Amendment,” Mr Trump said that law-abiding citizens should be able to obtain concealed carry permits in every state, and that military personnel should be allowed carry arms on bases and recruitment centers.
However, an “inexplicably overlooked and important part” of his position paper, Mr Trump told reporters, is his recommendation that “patriotic gun groups” like the Oath Keepers and Texans Against Gun Grabbers, should “get organized” into “well-regulated militias like the Second Amendment requires.”
“Bad things are happening out there which we need to look into,” he said, explaining that “a well-regulated militia” would be “properly trained, disciplined and coordinated.”
A “unified leadership at the top” should be put into place, though he was not interested at this point in time in providing that leadership himself.
“I have to get into Carly Fiorina’s face and make sure I miss my measles vaccination!” he said to general laughter.
Mssrs. Ware, Scabrous and Leech, LLC, a DC law firm, hailed Mr Trump’s new position paper as “a major breakthrough expanding everyone’s constitutional rights.”
The Second Amendment’s “prefatory language,” the firm said, “gives a particular emphasis and purpose to the citizen’s right to bear arms,” and that is the creation of well-regulated militias.
At the press conference Mr Trump explained: “Look, there’s two parts to the Amendment. One, the need for a well-regulated militia, and two, the people’s right to bear arms.
“For too long now we’ve been hung up on that second part, what does ‘infringed’ mean and so on? But meanwhile everyone’s forgotten about how the first part says that a well-regulated militia is necessary – note, is necessary – for the security of a free state.
“That’s what I call the Founding Fathers’ wisdom,” Mr Trump said. “It’s pretty clear, isn’t it, that the security of our free state is in jeopardy these days? Because, immigrants.”
He wound up: “So we need those militias. I got a big farm in up-state New York the Oath Keepers and similar groups can use for getting well-regulated. Maybe I can buy them all something nice to wear, too, like brown shirts or maybe black.
“I mean,” he added to general applause and the clinking of tea cups, “that’s just common sense, people!”
