“Enhanced Carry” Bill Making Waves

“Enhanced Carry” Bill Making Waves in Michigan BY TIM SCHMIDT - USCCA FOUNDER

With nearly every mass shooting recently—and throughout history—occurring in a gun-free zone, there's been a re-surging dialogue among law-abiding concealed carriers urging politicians to eliminate these crime-targeted areas once and for all. And in Michigan, it looks like people are listening. According to guns.com, “A pair of bills in the state senate that would swap the current ability for permit holders to open carry in Michigan pistol-free zones for the right to concealed carry, won approval in committee Tuesday.” Republican Senator Mike Green and Majority Leader Arlan Meekhok sponsored the bills—SB 442 and SB 0561, respectively—which “allow for an exemption to gun-free zones for permit holders who apply for and are granted an endorsement. This form of ‘enhanced carry’ is in use in other states such as Mississippi, where permit holders obtain additional training and then, after providing a certificate from a state-approved instructor, are granted an endorsement, which allows legal carry inside most places publicly posted as being gun-free.” Green’s measure specifically would allow permit holders to “carry concealed inside areas such as schools, day cares, bars, hospitals, college dorms or classrooms, casinos, religious facilities or entertainment venues that seat more than 2,500 people, which are currently off limits under state law.” On hand to testify on behalf of Green’s bill was John Lott, President and Founder of the Crime Prevention Research Center, the nation’s foremost authority on the relationship between guns and crime. Among Lott’s claims was something that anti-gunners seem to continually ignore: that it is the behavior of permit holders, rather than the actions of criminals, that should determine where we allow law-abiding citizens to carry guns. In reference to responsibly armed Americans and whether or not this specific group is committing crimes, Lott noted: “It’s hard to find any other group in the population that has as low of conviction rates for misdemeanors or felonies. Permit holders actually even have lower rates of convictions or arrests for misdemeanors or felonies than police officers do.” The statistics show, he said, that police officers are convicted of misdemeanors or felonies about 1/30th the rate of the general population, and that permit holders are convicted at a rate equal to 1/6th or 1/7th the rate of officers. That means, just as people like you and me have been saying all along, that law-abiding gun owners really are the “good guys.” The anti-gun argument that gun-free zones stop crime is getting old, and—as John Lott’s testimony helps point out—is grossly incorrect. It’s high time we put that argument—and gun-free zones across the country—to bed where they belong. Take Care and Stay Safe, Tim Schmidt Publisher - Concealed Carry Report USCCA Founder