President Donald Trump introduces Judge Neil Gorsuch. (YouTube, White House)
By Dave Workman
Senior Editor
Gun rights organizations were quick to applaud the nomination of federal Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court, which sent a strong reminder to Second Amendment activists across the country that elections do matter.
“We are delighted at President Donald Trump’s selection,” said Alan M. Gottlieb, founder and Executive Vice President of the Second Amendment Foundation. “Based on what we know and what others are saying about Judge Gorsuch, we can honestly say that there may not be a better candidate to fill the seat left vacant by Justice Antonin Scalia’s passing last year.”
“President Trump has made an outstanding choice in nominating Judge Gorsuch for the U.S. Supreme Court,” said Chris W. Cox, Executive Director of the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action. “He has an impressive record that demonstrates his support for the Second Amendment. We urge the Senate to swiftly confirm Judge Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, just as it did in confirming him to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit by a unanimous voice vote.”
With this nomination, activists suggest that Trump has fulfilled yet another of his campaign promises by nominating a judge with a perspective similar to the late Justice Scalia, whose seat on the high court Gorsuch will fill if confirmed by the Senate.
Still, liberal critics of the Trump administration, and particularly gun prohibition lobbying organizations, have denounced this nomination. The New York Times editorialized that Gorsuch has been nominated to fill “a stolen seat” on the court that should have been occupied by Barack Obama’s pick, Merrick Garland.
Last fall’s election was not just for the White House, but the Supreme Court and federal courts, which had been stacked with liberal activist jurists by Obama. At risk, had Clinton won and continued tilting the courts to the far left, was the right to keep and bear arms protected by the Second Amendment.
“During his tenure on the Tenth Circuit,” Cox said in a prepared statement, “Gorsuch has demonstrated his belief that the Constitution should be applied as the framers intended. To that end, he has supported the individual right to self-defense. Specifically, he wrote in an opinion that ‘the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to own firearms and may not be infringed lightly.’”
Judge Gorsuch has an impressive background, with a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University, a law degree from Harvard and a philosophy degree from Oxford. He served in the Justice Department under the George W. Bush administration.
“President Trump has kept his word,” Gottlieb said, “by nominating a superb high court candidate with an originalist approach to interpreting the Constitution, and particularly the Bill of Rights, as the Founders intended. We are eager to see him confirmed, and we are hopeful that he will enjoy smooth sailing through the confirmation process. After all, he was confirmed unanimously by the Senate when he was appointed to the Tenth Circuit Court.”
The American Conservative Union was out with a quick statement on the Gorsuch nomination, saying the Colorado native “a reliable defender of the Constitutional rights of every American. A self-described originalist who seeks to interpret the Constitution as the Founders intended, Judge Gorsuch’s opinions have often reflected a commitment to religious freedom and the Rule of Law.”
On the other hand, John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, the gun prohibition lobbying group founded and funded by anti-gun billionaire Michael Bloomberg, was out with an e-mail blast that states, among other things, “While Gorsuch’s record on guns isn’t long, it does suggest that he’s open to making it easier for some felons to have guns.”
Anti-gun Democrat Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) was quoted by Syracuse.com this morning stating, “Judge Gorsuch has repeatedly sided with corporations over working people, demonstrated a hostility toward women’s rights, and most troubling, hewed to an ideological approach to jurisprudence that makes me skeptical that he can be a strong, independent Justice on the Court.”
Still, some suggest that Judge Gorsuch, of the Tenth Circuit Court in Denver, may be exactly the assurance that the nation’s Second Amendment activists needed from Trump to justify helping put him in office last fall.
