In every country where firearms have been banned, there’s been an “inciting incident” that’s been used to justify the crackdown. And very often, this “inciting incident” is either overblown, manufactured, or misconstrued in some way. In Canada back in 2022, for example, Justin Trudeau used a mass shooting in the United States — specifically, the shooting at the elementary school in Uvalde, Texas — to justify a national ban on handgun sales in Canada.
Yes, he used a shooting in a foreign country, which was committed with a rifle, to justify a ban on handguns in Canada. And of course, Canadians went along with it. They didn’t even complain because, after all, they’d been conditioned, over many years, to accept an increasing number of restrictions on their right to own firearms. Bit by bit, they allowed the government to whittle away their rights. So eventually, when it came time for Justin Trudeau to suspend handgun sales entirely, based on a pretext that was obviously ridiculous, everyone just kind of rolled over. We’ve seen similar stories all over the world, in places like Australia, New Zealand, the UK, and so on.
Every conservative — everyone who wants the United States to continue to exist as a functional country, where all of these other nations have failed — has to be mindful of similar efforts to undermine our Second Amendment rights here at home. We have to pay attention when government officials attempt to use some kind of fake “inciting incident” to suspend our right to possess firearms. And we certainly have to pay attention when these efforts gain traction — when they appear to be working.
That’s the case right now. Lawsuits and political pressure by various states — particularly California — have successfully intimidated the weapons manufacturer Glock into dismantling virtually its entire product line. One of the most popular handgun manufacturers in the world, with probably the most recognizable brand, has been beaten into submission.
This is a story that hasn’t received anywhere near the attention it should be receiving. It’s obviously the first domino among many. If Glock doesn’t reverse this decision — if Democrats win this fight — then many, many more dominoes will fall in short order. Just like we saw in Canada, once you give these people any ground whatsoever, they will walk all over you.
So let’s begin with the “inciting incident” of this particular power grab. It was the worst mass shooting in the history of Sacramento, according to the local media, and it took place in April 2022. Several shooters were involved, as part of some kind of gang warfare. Six people were fatally wounded. Twelve others were injured.
One of the men who was apprehended was named Smiley Martin (the brother of Dandrae Martin, another suspect in the case). Smiley Martin was found in possession of a Glock 19 handgun with a “switch” attached to it, which is a device that enables it to fire rapidly, like a machine gun. Switches are illegal, but they can be obtained very easily or created with a 3D printer.
And it was determined that Smiley was one of the main shooters in this particular incident. Watch:
You heard in that report that Smiley Martin had a very long criminal record prior to this shooting. But they don’t explain why he was allowed out of prison, if that’s the case. Nor do they provide more detail on what exactly Smiley Martin did when he committed his other crimes.
But that’s a pretty big part of the story. So here’s The Associated Press, with some more background.
A suspect arrested in connection with last weekend’s mass shooting outside bars in Sacramento served less than half his 10-year sentence because of voter-approved changes to state law that lessened the punishment for his felony convictions and provided a chance for earlier release. Smiley Allen Martin was freed in February after serving time for punching a girlfriend, dragging her from her home by her hair and whipping her with a belt, according to court and prison records. Those count as nonviolent offenses under California law, which considers only about two dozen crimes to be violent felonies — such as murder, rape, arson and kidnapping. … Proposition 57 credits include good behavior while behind bars, though corrections officials declined to release Martin’s disciplinary report.
If you follow my show or read my articles, you know this is all sounding very familiar. It’s similar to what happened in Kentucky, with the child killer Ronald Exantus. As we discussed, Exantus brutally murdered a young boy and assaulted his father (and the boy’s sister). But his crimes were deemed “nonviolent” under Kentucky law, so he was let out of prison after serving just a few years. Even though the parole board didn’t want to release Smiley Martin, they had no choice under the law — just like they had to release Ronald Exantus.
In this case, just like Ronald Exantus, Smiley Martin obviously committed violent offenses. He punched a woman and whipped her with a belt. But because these offenses are somehow considered “nonviolent” in California, under the law that was passed in 2016, Smiley Martin was allowed out of prison after serving a fraction of his sentence. And he then used that opportunity to commit a mass shooting.
So how has the government of California responded to this development? Have they suggested that maybe they should amend the law so that the word “nonviolent” doesn’t refer to crimes that are obviously violent? Have they suggested any changes whatsoever that would prevent violent felons from getting out of prison after serving less than half of their sentences?
You probably know the answer to that question. Democrats in California reacted to this mass shooting by pushing yet another law — one that will effectively ban all Glock handguns in the state. For many years, Glocks have had special restrictions in places like Canada and California. And now the government, in the wake of this mass shooting, has decided to go for a total ban.
This is from a video posted by “Vince for California,” the only account I’ve seen on X that has pieced all this together. Watch:
Yes, you heard that correctly. Government officials in California cited the mass shooting in Sacramento as proof that we need a new law banning Glocks. That’s not because there’s anything wrong with Glocks, by themselves. It’s because career criminals — overwhelmingly young black men who pose with their illegally modified Glocks on TikTok all the time, and who constantly commit violent felonies and then get out of jail in five seconds — might modify the Glock to make it more dangerous. Because this relatively small demographic is breaking the law, therefore the most popular handgun in the world should be outlawed in California. (Technically, you can keep your current Glock, but you can’t buy a new one.)
That’s what they’re saying. That’s their plan. And it’s working. It’s almost as if the entire reason they let these violent thugs out of prison is so that they can commit more crimes, which Democrats will then, in turn, use to justify more crackdowns on our civil liberties. This is from a local news station in California.
Glock handguns, among the most popular pistols on the market, will no longer be available for purchase in California starting July 1, 2026. Gov. Gavin Newsom recently signed into law AB 1127, which prohibits the sale of Glocks because a small part can be modified or replaced to convert the gun into an automatic weapon. Although illegal, this modification is becoming increasingly popular among lawbreakers. Tyler Thompson, a Glock dealer at Redding Guns, said the impending ban has left him with only one Glock in stock.
Along with this law (which was subsidized by Soros and Mark Zuckerberg), there have been various lawsuits filed against Glock by Democrats — including cities like Seattle and Chicago, and states like Minnesota and New Jersey — which essentially blame the manufacturer for illegal modifications that people make to their firearms. It’s like when Democrats blamed Toyota for supposedly making their cars too easy to steal.
For about a million reasons, conservatives should fight these laws (and these lawsuits) with everything they have. The NRA and the Second Amendment Foundation are doing their part, and filing lawsuits, but there needs to be a much bigger effort. For one thing, here’s the law that California just passed.
Credit: LegiScan/California Assembly Bill 1127
The bill reads:
This bill would prohibit a licensed firearms dealer to sell, offer for sale, exchange, give, transfer, or deliver any semiautomatic machinegun-convertible pistol, except as specified. For these purposes, the bill would define “machinegun-convertible pistol” as any semiautomatic pistol with a cruciform trigger bar that can be readily converted by hand or with common household tools into a machine gun by the installation or attachment of a pistol converter, meaning any device or instrument that, when installed in or attached to the rear of the slide of a semiautomatic pistol, replaces the backplate and interferes with the trigger mechanism and thereby enables the pistol to shoot automatically more than one shot by a single function of the trigger.
Among other problems, this law is obviously unconstitutional.
To be clear, it doesn’t apply only to Glocks, but also to any handgun with a “cruciform trigger bar.”
Credit: us.Glock.com
Here’s what that looks like. Some Smith & Wesson firearms, along with some firearms from Shadow Systems and FMK Firearms, also have “cruciform trigger bars.” And yes, it’s true that, if they revamp their entire product lineup, Glock can get rid of these.
But Glock shouldn’t have to do that. Nor should any of these other companies. The Supreme Court has already held — correctly — that under our Constitution, Americans can own handguns that aren’t unreasonably dangerous. And there’s nothing unreasonably dangerous about a Glock. It’s about as vanilla as handguns get. If a handgun suddenly becomes “unreasonably dangerous” because someone makes an illegal modification to it, then every handgun will instantly become “unreasonably dangerous.”
And of course, that’s what California has in mind. We all know that, no matter what changes Glock decides to make to its handguns, in order to comply with this law, it will never be enough. It’s possible to modify any handgun (or rifle) to shoot “full auto”, within the meaning of this law. Probably ten days after Glock changes its handguns to comply with this law, someone will come up with a switch for the new model. It’s not going to be difficult. Many firearms experts have already made that point.
This is clearly, unambiguously, the first major step in a larger effort by Democrats to ban handguns. The only appropriate response is to fight it, right now. There is no limiting principle here. It’s like saying it should be illegal to own a car, because car bombs exist. The fact that someone can come in after the fact and make a product more dangerous by committing a felony does not mean that we should ban the product.
But Glock isn’t fighting back on principle. They’re not running ads in California, pointing out that Gavin Newsom let this mass shooter out of jail early, or that California already outlaws switches, or that the mass shooter was a felon who shouldn’t have been allowed to possess a firearm in the first place, or that he had a high-capacity magazine that’s also illegal in California. Glock isn’t running 24/7 ads, which makes the extremely obvious point that California could solve its gun problem overnight by actually enforcing its existing laws and by punishing violent criminals.
Instead, Glock is caving. They’re punishing every law-abiding gun owner in the country. They just announced that they’re ditching Gen 5 and starting to make a whole new “V series” of handguns that are supposedly compliant with this new law. They just sent this marketing material around.
Credit: us.Glock.com
It reads: “As part of GLOCK’s commitment to future innovations, we are making necessary updates to our product lines to align with upcoming offerings.”
So they don’t even mention why they’re doing this. They don’t demonstrate a shred of interest in defending Americans’ Second Amendment rights or contesting this flagrant overreach by Democrats in California, New Jersey, Minnesota, and so on. They don’t even provide any indication as to whether this new “V series” will be compatible with Gen 5 parts, including performance triggers and so on. Nor do they explain how they can possibly make a handgun that’s impossible to turn into a machine gun, under the law passed in California. They’re just hoping for the best, I guess.
And meanwhile, where is the Republican Party on this? Has a single prominent Republican made an issue out of the fact that Democrats just strong-armed Glock into dismantling its entire product line? If so, I’m not aware of it.
This is a total capitulation. There’s no other way to understand what’s happening here. It’s capitulation on Glock’s part. And it’s capitulation on the part of our elected representatives.
That would be unforgivable in normal times. It’s especially egregious now, after we’ve seen — again and again, in country after country — where total capitulation leads. Glock’s decision is going to embolden Democrats to do exactly what Leftists have done in Canada, Australia, and so on. They didn’t release Smiley Martin from prison, or fund these massive new changes to the law, so that Glock would release slightly-altered versions of its existing handguns. They released Smiley Martin from prison, and they passed this law, so that no one can buy a handgun ever again. They want to disarm the entire country. That is their ultimate objective.
That’s always been their objective. And with this decision by Glock, without much fanfare, they’re one very important step closer to achieving it.
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