One Step Up For America, One Step Back For Oregon.
05.17.2021
While Oregon gun owners continue to face costly battles on multiple fronts, there was good news from the US Supreme Court today.
The court ruled that police do not have the authority to enter a person’s home to seize firearms without a warrant.
Police officers are called upon to perform many civic tasks beyond their normal law enforcement duties, but that recognition is not “an open-ended license to perform them anywhere,” wrote Justice Clarence Thomas for the court.
This ruling could have a profound effect on “Red Flag” laws like the kind Senator Brian Boquist rammed through in Oregon a few years ago. Whether an “Extreme Risk Protection Order” will be considered a “warrant” is yet to be decided. However, it’s interesting that under Oregon’s law, a person can have their firearms seized without ever being accused of, let alone convicted of, a crime.
In the case before the court, the person whose guns were stolen by the police agreed to be taken to a hospital for a mental evaluation. In Oregon, even that is not required. In fact, under Oregon law a person whose guns are taken as a result of an “Extreme Risk Protection Order” is forbidden from using a positive mental health evaluation in their defense.
Meanwhile, Oregon is about to become the test case for another national issue. The OFF supported “Second Amendment Sanctuary Ordinance” was passed by the voters in Columbia County. The commissioners in the county then took the passed ordinance, rewrote it and then asked for “judicial review” of the ordinance as changed by them. While anti-gun forces were alerted to this request and then joined in the legal action, pro-gunners, including the people responsible for passing the ordinance, were kept in the dark and then blind sided by the inside effort to overturn it.
We are committed to defending the ordinance. With over a thousand counties across the country having passed ordinances of this kind, this case is extremely important. Not only for the merits of the ordinance , but for the underhanded way it is being challenged.
We will be faced with massive legal bills to defend the will of the voters in Columbia County. But this is a battle that simply must be fought. Today’s Supreme Court decision is a positive sign. But Oregon is moving further away from common sense gun laws every day.
Please consider helping in this crucial battle.
https://oregonfirearms.ejoinme.org/MyPages/DonationPage/tabid/70447/Default.aspx