Dear Second Amendment Supporters,
9am on Thursday morning in room 114 at the Statehouse is our chance to OPPOSE and testify against Governor Kasich’s gun-grab, HB585.
A direct assault on gun owners, HB585 would:
➤ Destroy due process for gun owners by creating secret, star-chamber court hearings that would allow for gun confiscation without a gun owner even being present to defend themselves.
➤ Destroy a gun owner’s 4th Amendment protections to be secure in their person, house, place or effects.
➤ Destroy a gun owner’s 5th Amendment rights by forcing them to testify on their own behalf just to prove the innocence that has already been stripped from them.
➤ Destroy a person’s 14th Amendment rights if a state creates a law that would “abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States,” or “deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
➤ Expand the size of the federal gun owner database that has proven useless at stopping mass killers.
➤ Ban certain firearms accessories even though there hasn’t been a single, documented use of such accessories ever used in a crime in America.
➤ Ban “armor piercing” handgun ammunition, even though nobody has ever used them to commit a crime in America.
As you probably guessed, Kasich and his cronies loaded this gun-control bill up with distracting, non-issue items to terrify weak-kneed legislators into voting for the bill out of pure fear of attacks at election time.
That’s the way this game is played in Columbus, and that’s why gun owners need to band together to STOP this attack on our gun rights.
There are three ways that you can help testify against it:
1) Attend the committee meeting Thursday morning at 9am in room 114 and personally testify against the bill.
This is the best, most effective way to make your voice heard.
Here’s what you need to do if you want to testify in the committee:
● Write up your testimony in written form.
This doesn’t have to be rocket science, and you don’t need to nail every portion of the bill.
It can be as easy as stating your name, where you’re from, that you’re opposed to the bill and that you’ll be voting according to the outcome of this bill.
But if you prefer to tackle a certain portion of the bill in detail, feel free, and a 5-7 minute testimony is excellent.
● Submit your written testimony 24 hours in advance.
This is standard in the committee process, so you’ll need to submit your testimony by 9am on Wedneday morning.
The written testimony you submit to the committee chair will be entered into the official Ohio Legislative Record, but is has to be submitted 24 hours in advance.
Our previous experience is that if you’re a little tardy in getting it in, they usually accept it, but please try to meet the 9am Wednesday morning deadline.
The written testimony that you plan to offer in committee should be emailed to [email protected].
You can attach it as a Word document to the email or you can write it as an actual email itself.
You might also want to preface your email with a phrase like, “Dear Jack Brubaker, I wish to give public testimony in Thursday morning’s State and Local Government Committee Hearing on House Bill 585. My written testimony is submitted with this email. If you have a witness form you’d like me to fill out before hand, please feel free to respond with it so that I can have it filled out before I get there.”
● Then simply show up on Thursday morning a little early.
People who plan to give public testimony have to fill out a witness slip, and if you aren’t able to do so before hand the committee chair’s aide will have extra copies there for you to fill out.
2) Attend the committee meeting in person to be a visual opponent to House Bill 585.
Bloomberg’s Lyin’ Commie Mommies do a good job of making sure their red-shirt radicals always show up to support the destruction of our Second Amendment.
It’s important that we have as many pro-gun, law-abiding, upstanding citizens as possible filling these rooms in opposition to this gun-grab!
If you can get the time off work, attendance at this hearing is far more important than any Rally held outside the Statehouse so far.
This is where the rubber meets the road.
If gun-control is going to pass here in Ohio, it has to go through our General Assembly and through these committee hearings.
If gun owners aren’t present to fight back, the gun-grabbers will likely win the day.
And I don’t know about you, but that is simply unacceptable.
So please take a few hours on Thursday morning to come fight for your gun rights!
DETAILS: The committee starts at 9am on Thursday morning, it will be in room 114 on the Statehouse’s first floor, and they have already reserved an overflow room.
Please come if you can, and load up your car with your pro-gun friends as well!
3) Submit a written testimony against House Bill 585 to be entered into the record!
If you can’t make it to the committee hearing on Thursday, or if you don’t feel comfortable speaking in front of the committee but still want to attend, this is an excellent way to be effective.
Here’s what you need to do:
● Write up your testimony in written form.
We’ve taken the liberty of pre-writing a testimony for you below – feel free to modify it as much as you please, and make sure you fill out your name, city and zip code at the top!
● Submit it to Chairwoman Anielski’s office before Wednesday morning at 9:00am.
As you’ll see below when you click “Submit My Opposition to HB585,” the email address for you to submit it to is [email protected].
If clicking the image above fails to bring up a pre-written testimony, please copy and paste the pre-written testimony below, as well as the email address, into your own email software.
Then, modify it as much as you like, make sure you fill out your name, city and zip at the top of the email and send it!
This is an excellent option if you are unable to attend Thursday’s hearing, and a great option if you plan on attending the hearing but don’t wish to publicly speak against it!
[CONTACT: first name], there’s a lot on the line at Thursday’s hearing.
I hope you can attend in person, but most importantly I hope you’ll take advantage of this opportunity to OPPOSE HB585!
Mobilizing gun owners across the state to this fight isn’t free, and we could desperately use your contributions to help us fight for your gun rights.
But whatever you do, take action TODAY!
For Freedom,
Chris Dorr, Director
Ohio Gun Owners
P.S. With Thursday’s Opponent Testimony Hearing on Kasich’s Gun-Control bill fast approaching, there are three ways you can help stop it.
Please read the email above and plan on attending Thursday morning’s committee hearing!
If you’re not able to make it, please click the image below to have your testimony AGAINST HB585 entered into the record as OPPOSING this radical gun-grab.
Make sure you fill in your name, city and zip code at the top of the email, too!
Subject Line: My Testimony Against HB585
Message: Dear Jack Brubaker,
My name is FIRST LAST, I live in CITY, OH ZIPCODE, and I would like to submit my written opposition testimony against House Bill 585 for entry into the public record at Thursday’s Opponent Testimony Hearing on HB585.
Testimony:
Chairwoman Anielski, Vice-Chair Hambley, Ranking Member Holmes and members of the House State and Local Government Committee,
Thank you for the opportunity to testify in opposition to House Bill 585, the gun-control bill by Representative Mike Henne and Governor Kasich.
Criminals don’t obey laws.
What seems to be an obvious statement often times escapes people looking to “do something” in the wake of a tragedy like Parkland, FL or Santa Fe, TX, but the truth remains.
Dianne Feinstein said herself that no new laws will prevent mass killers.
The simple, underlying truth is that a mind that premeditates the murder of innocent fellow humans is not one to be deterred by the propositions of House Bill 585.
The background check system has proven to be a failure through countless mass-shooting tragedies.
Armor piercing handgun cartridges haven’t been used in violent crimes in Ohio, and nearly any rifle cartridge is capable of defeating armor.
Nor have bumpstocks been used in the commission of a crime in the state of Ohio.
In regards to these issues, HB585 is an Unconstitutional “solution” in search of a problem.
However, perhaps the most egregious part of HB585 is the destruction of due process via “ex parte” hearings and even the emergency protection orders themselves.
America was founded on the fundamental jurisprudence doctrines of “innocent until proven guilty” and due process.
HB585 infringes upon those doctrines when it infringes on our 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 14th Amendment rights.
The Ohio state Constitution is just as clear in Article 1, subsection 10:
“In any trial, in any court, the party accused shall be allowed to appear and defend in person and with counsel; to demand the nature and cause of the accusation against him, and to have a copy thereof; to meet the witnesses face to face, and to have compulsory process to procure the attendance of witnesses in his behalf, and a speedy public trial by an impartial jury of the county in which the offense is alleged to have been committed; but provision may be made by law for the taking of the deposition by the accused or by the state, to be used for or against the accused, of any witness whose attendance can not be had at the trial, always securing to the accused means and the opportunity to be present in person and with counsel at the taking of such deposition, and to examine the witness face to face as fully and in the same manner as if in court.”
This legislation will not increase public safety. Rather, it will only further embolden the criminal class.
Please publicly oppose it, block it in committee and vote NO at every opportunity.
Thank you.