[Editor’s update: S.329, a bill that would ban possession of firearms in bars and restaurants with liquor licenses, passed the VT Senate but is ‘hanging on the wall’ in House Judiciary, where the committee leadership says it will stay.]
by Steve MacDonald, Granite Grok
The Commies in Burlington, Vermont, have been trying to ban guns for years, and so we’re clear, I mean, guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens. Criminals will still carry, and that’s the truth, but this is Burlington, where the truth is what they say it is, and the excuse they came up with to ask for a ban in bars was a shooting that wasn’t in a bar.
- So, Only Criminals Can Carry Guns in Bars?
- Proposed Gun Ban Will Lead to More Shootings
- MacDonald: Dems Didn’t Want Guns In Bars, But Bar Drinks On the Street is a Winner
- MACDONALD: Burlington Still Trying to Ban Guns In Bars
It was “bar” adjacent, and if you are concerned about homicides in Downtown Burlington, you should ban Democrats and progressives from public office. Actually, everything wrong in Burlington could be resolved if you stopped electing lefties, but Bernietown has more Proglodytes in it than you’ll be able to hit with a hockey stick. The Democrats there are so far left that they created a party to the left of Democrats, which is saying something, and a bag of chips in Burlington.
So, yeah, they keep voting for a city ordinance to ban guns [insert any place you can think of here], but in Vermont, you need the Legislature’s approval. That hasn’t been as easy as it sounds, and whatever you may think about Governor Phil Scott’s Republican street cred, he has repeatedly said he’d veto that ask if it ever made it to his desk.
Burlington, being Burlington, they can’t stop asking. Please, may we ban guns in bars, and this time around, the lefties in the legislature have decided not to let this imagined crisis go to waste.
While the discussion on Thursday was dominated by the provision in S.329 that bans firearms in bars and liquor-license holding restaurants statewide, the bill contains multiple sections including a statewide prohibition on machine guns and new laws for possessing firearms after a court hospitalization order or incompetence to stand trial.
If you look, you won’t find any incidents of shootings in bars in Vermont. I couldn’t find any. There have been a number of shootings outside bars, some of which are alleged to have started in the bar.
- August 2024 (Burlington): A man was shot and killed outside Red Square on Church Street following a dispute inside the bar.
- December 2015 (Burlington): A man was shot and killed outside the Zen Lounge on Church Street after an argument in the bar.
- 2018 (Rutland): Two separate shooting incidents occurred near bars in downtown Rutland in a single month, prompting increased security measures by local businesses.
- 2017/2018 (Barre/Montpelier): A fatal shooting began as an altercation in a Barre bar, ending with a murder in a parking lot.
- Feb 2019 (Burlington): A bystander was shot outside Nectar’s bar during an altercation.
I can assure you that a ban inside restaurants or bars will not in any way affect the frequency of shootings outside them because the sort of people who shoot people in front of such establishments don’t typically care what the law says.
Gun-free zones, by their nature, attract the illegal use of firearms, knives, and blunt instruments. A ban in Burlington or, as the Senate suggests, statewide, even if it gets past a second look in the lower chamber or the Governor’s desk (which it would not), is more likely to increase crime, especially violent crime.
You don’t have to believe me, just look it up yourself. The most dangerous places in America have disarmed law-abiding citizens. They account for the majority of crime and most of the violent crime in America. If you want more crime, ban lawful carry and/or concealment of firearms by ordinary citizens.
You’d be right to wonder if more crime and chaos are what Democrats are after, but you already know the answer to that question, too. Yes, they do. Criminals have more rights than you do. Democrats oppose law enforcement, law and order, rule of law, bail, detention, borders, incarceration, or the Constitution, unless it has a specific partisan situational political advantage.
Public Safety is the last thing on their mind, and their policy towards civilian ownership and possession of firearms proves that everywhere they get their way.
Vermont has had a few rough years when it comes to crime, all of it directly connected to progressive policy priorities. And while they may not get any version of a gun ban bill into law this session, the tweaks tell you where they want to go, and whatever version fails will go into a drawer and have a coming-out party in every successive session until they get it passed into law.
If the rest of Vermont is tired of Burlington Progressives pushing their commie crap on the rest of the state, they need to get off their asses and show up for every election to vote them out of office everywhere else.
You’re not going to get them out of Burlington, but if the Dems can’t secure majorities in the legislature, and you keep them out of the Governor’s office, you can slow the bleeding and possibly even stop it. Reversing what has been done in recent decades may take an act of God, but not without voters who have the sense to help themselves.