Gun owner liability insurance

1
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/san-jose-g ... 5_-ZzQibX8
San Jose, California — This city voted Tuesday night to require gun owners to carry liability insurance and pay an annual fee, in what's believed to be the first measure of its kind in the United States.


The San Jose City Council overwhelmingly approved the measure despite opposition from gun owners who said it would violate their Second Amendment rights and promised to sue.

The Silicon Valley city of about 1 million followed a trend of other Democratic-led cities that have sought to rein in violence through stricter rules. But while similar laws have been proposed, San Jose is the first city to pass one, according to Brady United, a national nonprofit that advocates against gun violence.
Council members, including several who had lost friends to gun violence, said it was a step toward dealing with gun violence, which Councilman Sergio Jimenez called "a scourge on our society."
Having liability insurance would encourage people in the 55,000 households in San Jose who legally own at least one registered gun to have gun safes, install trigger locks and take gun safety classes, Mayor Sam Liccardo said.

The liability insurance would cover losses or damages resulting from any accidental use of the firearm, including death, injury, or property damage, according to the ordinance. If a gun is stolen or lost, the owner of the firearm would be considered liable until the theft or loss is reported to authorities.

However, gun owners who don't have insurance won't lose their guns or face any criminal charges, the mayor said.
The insurance would be purchased through homeowner's or renter's insurance and would cover everyone in a gun owner's household, CBS SF BayArea reports.
The council also voted to require gun owners to pay an estimated $25 fee, which would be collected by a yet-to-be-named nonprofit and doled out to community groups to be used for firearm safety education and training, suicide prevention and domestic violence and mental health services.

The ordinance is part of a broad gun control plan Liccardo announced following the May 26 mass shooting at the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority rail yard that left nine people dead, including the employee who opened fire on his colleagues and then killed himself.

At an hours-long meeting, critics argued that the fee and liability requirements violated their right to bear arms and would do nothing to stop gun crimes, including the use of untraceable, build-it-yourself "ghost guns."

"You cannot tax a constitutional right. This does nothing to reduce crime," one speaker said.

"People got killed and you got the audacity to come up in here and act like you're going to be the savior of us all," another said, according to CBS SF BayArea.

However, others strongly backed the measure.

"My daughter was shot and killed in San Jose so I know firsthand the terrible loss," one supporter said, according to CBS SF BayArea.

"I lost one of my childhood friends Michael Rudometkin last year," CBS SF BayArea quoted Council member Raul Peralez as saying.

The measure didn't address the massive problem of illegally obtained weapons that are stolen or purchased without background checks.

Liccardo acknowledged those concerns.

"This won't stop mass shootings and keep bad people from committing violent crime," the mayor said, but added most gun deaths nationally are from suicide, accidental shootings or other causes and even many homicides stem from domestic violence.

Liccardo also said gun violence costs San Jose taxpayers $40 million a year in emergency response services.

Some speakers argued that the law would face costly and lengthy court challenges.

Before the vote, Sam Paredes, executive director of Gun Owners of California, said his group would sue if the proposal takes effect, calling it "totally unconstitutional in any configuration."
"Vote 'no' on this ridiculous law that'll get shot down in the courts before you waste more of San Jose's money," another said, according to CBS SF BayArea.

But Liccardo said some attorneys had already offered to defend the city pro bono.

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

8
Government mandates for private insurance have been determined to be Constitutionally sound by the Supreme Court. If they weren't, the ACA would be a smoking crater.

Without touching the question of whether this is a good idea or even if the club is going to oppose it in court - for owners who want to comply with San Jose law, or are simply interested in carrying this kind of liability coverage, can the LGC help hook people up?

Gun owner liability insurance

9
The ACA mandate should be a smoking crater, but you can thank squishy justice Robert’s for that.

Regarding the recent nonsense from CA, this, like all other liberal gun control nonsense will be pushed back by conservative backed orgs and funding…funding liberals are trying to run dry.

I don’t personally appreciate the fact that my donations to these orgs have to go to fight this crap in Democrat run states when there are bigger issue at the federal level, but it’s part of the deal I guess.

Y’all hate conservatives so much, but you all benefit by keeping 2A rights we fight to overturn while your side constantly tries to abolish them.

I don’t get it. I read this board a lot trying to understand. I don’t post much…and I won’t respond, so flame away.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

12
featureless wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 9:48 am
highdesert wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 9:14 pm I expect this will get challenged in state court or federal court or maybe both. CA allows local preemption, so I expect more of the same from other counties and cities in CA.
And CA9 will say "great idea, state! Experiment away!" And SCOTUS will not take it.
I think SCOTUS should take it, not because 2A, but because privacy has to be invaded in order to know whom to charge. Certainly there could be point of sale paper works, but we all know that dozens of people in California already own guns, and that that information is not readily available to anyone not a Chinese or Russian hacker.

( I had a few extra "that's" left over from yesterday.)

CDFingers
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

13
CDFingers wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 9:53 am
featureless wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 9:48 am
highdesert wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 9:14 pm I expect this will get challenged in state court or federal court or maybe both. CA allows local preemption, so I expect more of the same from other counties and cities in CA.
And CA9 will say "great idea, state! Experiment away!" And SCOTUS will not take it.
I think SCOTUS should take it, not because 2A, but because privacy has to be invaded in order to know whom to charge. Certainly there could be point of sale paper works, but we all know that dozens of people in California already own guns, and that that information is not readily available to anyone not a Chinese or Russian hacker.

( I had a few extra "that's" left over from yesterday.)

CDFingers
Nah, privacy is no longer an issue. The state has already turned over gun registration information to other entities for "research" purposes. AB 173, we have a thread on it here somewhere. SCOTUS might someday decide it's not ok in 5 years or so, but the data is already out of the bottle.

Edited because I can't type or spell today...
Last edited by featureless on Thu Jan 27, 2022 10:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

14
featureless wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 9:48 am
highdesert wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 9:14 pm I expect this will get challenged in state court or federal court or maybe both. CA allows local preemption, so I expect more of the same from other counties and cities in CA.
And CA9 will say "great idea, state! Experiment away!" And SCOTUS will not take it.
I think this is what will happen.
Image
Image

"Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated!" Loquacious of many. Texas Chapter Chief Cat Herder.

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

16
sikacz wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 10:25 am
featureless wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 9:48 am
highdesert wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 9:14 pm I expect this will get challenged in state court or federal court or maybe both. CA allows local preemption, so I expect more of the same from other counties and cities in CA.
And CA9 will say "great idea, state! Experiment away!" And SCOTUS will not take it.
I think this is what will happen.

Yes and laws will vary from county to county and city to city, cross a line and you can be arrested and jailed. Like some people avoid traveling through states with extreme gun laws. Pure chaos, a lot like time and zones in the US 1800s.
American railroads maintained many different time zones during the late 1800s. Each train station set its own clock making it difficult to coordinate train schedules and confusing passengers. Time calculation became a serious problem for people traveling by train (sometimes hundreds of miles in a day), according to the Library of Congress. Every city in the United States used a different time standard, so there were more than 300 local sun-times to choose from. Railroad managers tried to address the problem by establishing 100 railroad time zones, but this was only a partial solution to the problem.

Operators of the new railroad lines needed a new time plan that would offer a uniform train schedule for departures and arrivals. Four standard time zones for the continental United States were introduced on November 18, 1883.
https://www.timeanddate.com/time/time-z ... story.html
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

17
CDFingers wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 7:46 pm How do they know whom to charge for the insurance and the fee? Inquiring minds want to know.

CDFingers
It's faulty at best. I attended and spoke at the meeting. The game plan is that the city will have the state of CA notify "San Jose" gun owners as well as collect the "fee". In turn, the state will send said fee's to the non-profit who will in turn disperse the funds to other non-profits selected by the City Manager.

The mayor relied heavily in the usual anti-civil rights suspects which we all know and love in creating this and I'm not sure that some of these out of state actors understand how data is kept and collected by the state. For example, I think that there is an impression that there is a Megan's Law type registry for gun owners in CA which requires the owner to notify the state wherever they move, which is not the case, with the exception of assault weapons, class III and .50 cals if I am not mistaken. Someone who purchased a gun back in 1991 filled out some paperwork that got sent to the state with their address "at the time of purchase". For the vast majority of guns there is no requirement in place to notify the state when one moves, other than the exceptions above. The state began collecting serial numbers and the vitals of guns owners of handguns in 1972 and long guns in 1991. Tracing guns to current owners is obviously possible, but today my understanding is that it's tedious and not currently "fit for mass production."

When I attended the meeting I had just assumed that this would have been a slam dunk for the mayor with perhaps an hour of discussion and a unanimous vote. That was not the case. The discussion lasted for 4 hours with even those council members who voted for this applying significant concern/scrutiny towards the mayor, and the 2 part vote was not unanimous, which surprised me. 96% of the 1,300 submitted written comments were in opposition to this and the majority of those who spoke were in opposition to this. Those in opposition were diverse by most metrics which I got the sense was a surprise to the mayor and council. I really want to congratulate the 2A community for showing up. I was expecting the usual...... bitch online, don't show up, and have yet another meeting monopolized by the Bloomberg crowd. We had a huge turnout and while the outcome was not in our favor I felt energized none the less which I hope spreads to anyone reading this.

Pink Pistols showed up, Asian American Gun Owners showed up, CRPA showed up.......... didn't notice if the LGC or NRA showed up though.

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

19
joshnickmc wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 9:08 pm Yeah, how is this not a tax on a constitutionally guaranteed right?
A few years ago the state of CA did a bit of language cosplay which redefined the threshold for what is called a "tax" vs a "fee". The constraint however is that a "fee" must in turn provide a service to the person paying the fee. In this case, the City of San Jose is stating that these non-profit services would be available to gun owners. Bear in mind that at the time this was passed the NONE of the following was determined: 1) who the non-profits would be. 2) the types of services that would benefit guns owners paying these fee's.

2 of the council members whom I would characterize as the most progressive on the council were eager to get some of their pet projects into the mix......... which have practically no direct benefit to gun owners. I got bit uncomfortable with this exchange as it gave me the impression it was gearing up to be a shell game. Furthermore, it wasn't clear if some of these funds could be redirected via the non-profits into the hands of Bloomberg groups.

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

20
joeblow9999 wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 1:45 pm I got bit uncomfortable with this exchange as it gave me the impression it was gearing up to be a shell game. Furthermore, it wasn't clear if some of these funds could be redirected via the non-profits into the hands of Bloomberg groups.
Menken's quote, ""For every complex problem, there's a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." Democrats like Republicans come up with simplistic solutions to very complex problems and then declare victory and condemn the other party. And they tout themselves as the smarter party. The great lesson of Watergate, follow the money.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

21
Well I think it’s pretty stupid, of course. But the comparison to the ACA isn’t that great. The ACA is essentially a public benefit (technically) with a “fee” or whatever (I’ve done some tax vs fee cases and it’s all a mess because the “test” is so useless that it’s really just whatever the judge wants to find) that you have to pay for, whether you use it or not. Kind of like me having to pay for nuclear weapons when I think they should all be dismantled etc. It does not involve the exercise of a constitutional right. Not that you’re all not right about what the courts are probably going to do. They just ignore that kind of thing. Thus, the taxes on firearms and ammunition are fine- but no poll tax. Ugh.

Re: Gun owner liability insurance

22
featureless wrote: Thu Jan 27, 2022 1:39 pm Thanks for that report, joeblow. Interesting that they passed it despite so much concern and opposition. As usual, all rights are precious except gun rights. Fuck those gun people.
The meeting started with the City Manager notifying the public that the council was in violation of the Brown Act (closed door, non-transparent, collusion) and that by notifying the public that they were in violation of the Brown Act that was enough to fulfill the requirements of the law. LOL Bear in mind that the passing of this was a forgone conclusion. Some council members jumped right in to discussing future meetings on next steps to implementing the law, however most council members spent a lot of time asking questions.

The mayor looked visibly uncomfortable and I really don't think that he or other council members had any idea that so many people would "show up" in opposition. Such is the byproduct when one develops a policy within a bubble I suspect. Furthermore, the mayor almost exclusively met with and crafted this with Moms Demand Action and Everytown along with his staff. He stated on the call that he also worked with the NRA on however one council member corrected him and stated that the person was a former "NRA instructor" which tripped the mayor up and he quickly passed the buck onto one of his staff members for telling him that in the first place.

Early on the call the mayor indicated that this scheme would also cover "intentional" events. Again, this was put under scrutiny by various council members at which point the mayor corrected himself. This is key, and I'm not sure if during the course of this soap opera if this misinformation was deliberate or unintentional on the part of the mayors office. The mayors gist has been all along that this measure would "pay for gun violence" which like all vague cosplay language gives the voter the impression that it covers all so called "gun violence". It doesn't. Depending upon the policy it would cover "negligent" and "accidental" events, not "intentional". "Negligent" itself gets murky in regards to how insurance companies define this, let alone pay out on it.

While I realize that we aren't supposed to swear on these boards....... this is shaping up to be one big cluster-F for the mayor. I was one of the last speakers and one of the things that I mentioned was following: "In 2020 Californians purchased a record number of firearms, 1,166,836 to be exact. We also had a record number of first time gun owners. 2020 was also a year where the face of new gun owners changed dramatically with 48% new owners being women, 34% being white, 24% hispanic, 23% being black and 19% being asian. I am a life long Democrat and our party is on a collision course with the 2nd Amendment among its own party members, aside from the rest of the country. "

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Bing [Bot] and 3 guests