In 2021, Colorado lawmakers passed several laws that made it harder for law-abiding citizens to own or carry a gun. For example, last June, lawmakers successfully passed Senate Bill 21-256, allowing local governments to enact any gun law or regulation it wants, as long as the rules are not less restrictive than current Colorado law.
Also, last June, lawmakers passed House Bill 21-1298, which requires gun dealers to get background check approval — no matter how long it takes — before transferring a gun. In some instances, HB 1298 allows for indefinite denial with no recourse.
The argument for passing these bills was to reduce gun violence. But, as we discovered, the true purpose was nothing more than to erode Second Amendment rights. Well, 2022’s legislative session is shaping up for more of the same.
On Jan. 19, House Democrats Tom Sullivan (Arapahoe), and Jennifer Bacon (Denver), along with Democratic Senators Rhonda Fields (Arapahoe), and Sonya Jaquez Lewis (Boulder), introduced House Bill 22-1086, “The Vote Without Fear Act.” Here’s why this is yet another attempt to curtail the Second Amendment.
The Vote Without Fear Misnomer
At first glance, HB 1086, “The Vote Without Fear Act,” sounds beneficial. After all, exercising the right to vote is a cornerstone of our Constitutional Republic. But when you read HB 1086, you find that it’s about gun control.
Indeed, HB 1086 prohibits “openly carrying a firearm within any polling location or central count facility, or within 100 feet of a ballot drop box or any building in which a polling location or central count facility is located, while an election or any related ongoing election administration activity is in progress.”
If someone is caught “Openly carrying a firearm inside or within 100 feet of a polling location, central count facility, or drop box is a misdemeanor, punishable by a maximum $1,000 fine, up to 364 days imprisonment in the county jail, or both.”
Consider the following map:
The blue dots are ballot drop box locations and in-person polling places. In Colorado, there are more than 400 ballot drop box locations and 150 polling places. If HB 1086 passes, you can’t come within 100 feet of the above blue dots with a gun during an election or when “any related ongoing election administration activity is in progress.”
The problem is that local elections happen all the time and are not just relegated to state elections every two years.
Nothing in the bill protects someone from unknowingly driving past a polling place with a gun and being pulled over. In fact, the only exception states, “A person who openly carries a firearm that the person owns on the person’s private property that is within the 100-foot buffer zone or while traveling directly between the person’s private property and a place outside 100-foot buffer zone.”
In other words, in someone lives within 100 feet of a dropbox location or an in-person polling place, that person can’t be charged with a fine/jail time if they travel within the 100-foot buffer zone with a gun. BUT if you, as a gun-carrying citizen, drive within 100 feet of a voting location and are pulled over for any reason, you could hypothetically be charged with violating HB 1086.
Overregulations is the Point
The Second Amendment guarantees a citizen’s right to possess a firearm by stating, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Consequently, lawmakers must be careful and can’t directly outlaw or infringe on owning a gun.
However, they can make owning a gun so onerous that owning a gun, or carrying it with you for personal protection, becomes impractical.
Colorado lawmakers are quick to argue that “intimidation” is why they want to limit open carry near voting locations. But just like SB 256 won’t impact gun violence in Colorado, HB 1086 won’t protect anyone from intimidation. Indeed, Democratic lawmakers failed to cite any proof that open carry “intimidation” is a problem in Colorado, and the fact is most people drive up to a ballet drop box, and never leave their car. Thus, “intimidation” is a false and misleading argument designed to obfuscate the true goal —eradicating personal gun ownership.
What You Can Do
As of this writing, HB 1086 has passed the House and Senate and is headed to Gov. Polis, where he is expected to sign it into law. As such HB 1086 will soon become law in Colorado. But that doesn’t mean you can’t contact your representative and tell them how you feel about the eroding of your Second Amendment rights. More importantly, the best way to stop attacks of this kind is to vote in the upcoming November election against candidates that want to do away with the Second Amendment.
Wouldn’t the fact that the US has the highest rate of gun deaths per capita in the first world indicate that there is a problem with guns in this country?
[…] General Assembly have worked to increase barriers to gun ownership. And with recent bills like HB 22-1086 successfully making their way through the legislative process (link to be included once my article […]
Thank you for the heads up.