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April 19, 2021 01:25 PM UTC

Polis Signs Two Major Gun Safety Bills Into Law

  • 72 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols
Gov. Polis signs House Bill 21-1106, safe storage of firearms.

As the Colorado Sun’s Jesse Paul reports:

Gov. Jared Polis on Monday signed two bills tightening gun regulations in Colorado into law — the first new firearm restrictions enacted in the state since the red flag bill became law in 2019.

The legislation was introduced before the deadly attack on a Boulder King Soopers in March, though the shootings brought greater urgency to the measures, which are mainly focused on reducing gun-related suicides.

Colorado House Democrats led by Rep. Tom Sullivan celebrate in a release this afternoon:

“There’s no single gun safety policy that can put an end to the epidemic of gun violence in America, but by taking commonsense steps like the two laws signed today, we can start to make a dent and save some lives,” said Rep. Tom Sullivan, D-Centennial. “Reporting a missing firearm is a simple measure that will stop firearms from ending up in the wrong hands and give law enforcement more tools to find these weapons before they end up in crime scenes.”

“Coloradans are tired of seeing gun violence rip families apart and take precious lives away from us far too soon,” said Rep. Leslie Herod, D-Denver. “Our bill to require that missing firearms be reported to police is a simple and commonsense request that will hopefully prevent senseless tragedies like the one that took Isabella Joy Thallas’ life. I’m immensely proud that we were able to honor her memory by naming this law after her today.”

“Asking all gun owners in Colorado to safely store their firearms the way the majority of responsible gun owners already do is a small measure that can save countless lives,”said Representative Kyle Mullica, D-Northglenn. “A simple and affordable lock on a firearm could prevent the type of tragedies and injuries that befall Colorado families every day.”

We wrote earlier this month about the passage of Senate Bill 21-078, the “Isabella Joy Thallas Act” named after a victim of gun violence in Denver killed with an assault weapon stolen from a Denver police officer. Back in March we covered the ten-hour marathon debate in the Colorado House over House Bill 21-1106, which requires gun owners in households with either children or prohibited persons use either a gun lock or store them in a gun safe.

In both cases, these bills passed the Colorado General Assembly without a single Republican vote. That’s the norm of course for gun laws in modern American politics, but it’s worth noting in this case since these are some of the easiest to justify proposals to reduce the harm from gun violence out there today–in theory much less controversial than the 2019 “red flag” law, not to mention the 2013 gun safety bills that resulted in political backlash for Democrats.

With the public overwhelmingly in favor of gun control going well beyond safe storage and reporting of lost and stolen guns, this was a missed opportunity for Republicans to show reason that might have afforded them cover in more contentious battles down the road. For Gov. Polis and majority Colorado Democrats, it’s yet another win on an issue for which wins, at least at the federal level, are in dishearteningly short supply.

If you want more wins like this, it starts with giving our leaders in Colorado the credit they deserve.

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72 thoughts on “Polis Signs Two Major Gun Safety Bills Into Law”

    1. You’ll feel plenty deterred when a victim’s family sues your fluffy little tail off . . .

      . . . and your defense for not following the law comes down to, “it was only a $25 fine”?

      Sniveling dumbass!

      Congrats on the Ttump & Gardner landslides!

          1. You are assuming that the criminal doesn't already have a firearm.  

            Are you seriously asserting that a person should not be permitted to have personal protection in an instant?

            "After all, you don't bring a knife to a gun fight." -Barak Obama

                2. Do you lock your car, dang? If so, why? You might need to get into it quickly, and that dang key is so inconvenient. Do you let your 8 year old drive the car? Why not? Do you let random strangers drive your car? Have you ever had a breathalyzer attached to it so you have to “blow sober” in order to drive? Why do you think that “infringement” was put in place? 
                  As far as the Constitution goes, SCOTUS’  2018 Heller decision says in Syllabus 2

                  2. Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of fire- arms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.  Miller’s holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those “in common use at the time” finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons.

                3. Rather than play into the very rare scenario of home invasion, I'd rather think about the larger issue of junior or some other relative or aquaintance borrowing a gun for the sole purpose of commiting suicide, which IIRC accounts for about half of all gun fatalities. 

        2. Pardon me, Mr. Criminal, while I try to remember if I left my gun in my daughter’s playpen or my son’s crib, as you attack my family?

          1. What a ridiculous response.  

            Yeah, it's right there, in the playpen, next to the molotov coctail, frozen water bottles, and laser pointers you plan to use in the peaceful protest tonight because Chouvin wasn't immediately publicly executed after the trial.

            So dumb.

            2. Since you’re losing the argument, you’ll have to do better at distraction, changing the topic, hyperbole, trying to make your opponent defend an absurd “straw man”,  and personal attacks. We’ve all had lots of practice with Polsters who are much better with these tactics than you are. 

    2. It's good to see that you've finally come around to supporting more meaningful restrictions such as absolute civil and criminal liability. Common ground at last!

    3. Maybe instead of a constant dollar penalty, it should be adjusted based on the reported income of the household, as some states are doing for speeding fines. 

      Or, in a nod to the variability of possible harms, have varying fines based on the destructive potential of the weapon.  $25 for a single shot .22 derringer, with increases for weapons with heavier ammunition, higher muzzle velocity, and more rounds to be fired before reloading. 

      1. I like the idea of heavier penalties for more destructive weapons. Something that can shoot hundreds of people a minute shouldn’t see daylight outside of a gun safe, or at a shooting range.

      2. Moderatus actually has a valid point, a rather rare occurrence. These are feel good bills, but aren’t really enforceable. Charing someone with unsafe storage, as an example, would likely occur only after some sort of other crime.

        JiD also has a good point in his second paragraph. Maybe a $500 fine for a missing AR-15; or unsafe storage of an AR-15; would have had more teeth.

          1. So, you're thanking Banger for suggesting that the fine should be a lot steeper, or that the bills didn't go far enough?  Or did you fail to read his full post, because reading is too hard for you?

            You just stopped halfway through his first sentence, because you took it as the validation you so desperately crave.

            1. I think what yiu're all missing is that it's now a crime to not secure your gun. One can no longer hide behind "it's not against the law." So it opens a whole can of whoop-ass in a civil proceeding if you're grossly negligent. 

        2. Ain’t you been listening at all? — slippery slope . . .

          . . . today we got him for $25, next week we’ll be taking away Fluffy’s BB-gun and his douche cannon, too!

      3. Uhh, Polis already passed legislation on magazine capacity, so that part is out.  

        Define heavier ammunition.  You refer to .22, but the dreaded ArmaLite Rifle-15 (AR-15) fires a .223 or 5.56 ‘ll which is nearly the identical diameter round as your .22.  All of the “heavier ammunition” is typically used for big game hunting, and is impractical for a mass shooting.

        Muzzle velocity?  Many .22 rifles and even air rifles exceed 2000 fps, while many “heavy” rounds, like .45, are sub-sonic.  

        Your suggestion also would be a paperwork nightmare and impossible to enforce.

        1. You got the “uhh” right here, . . .

          . . . but Hickenlooper was the magazine-capacity governor.

          (And he later apologized for that . . .)

        2. Interesting. First you say that standard long guns are impractical for mass shootings. We could stop right there. 

          Then you downplay the lethality of ARs and their .223 bullets. Go ahead and google "ER doc and AR wounds" and see what comes up. There are lots of trauma docs saying they see horrific wounds from ARs that they don't see from other guns (because that's what they're supposed to do, right?). 

          1. What I Saw Treating the Victims From Parkland Should Change the Debate on Guns

            In a typical handgun injury, which I diagnose almost daily, a bullet leaves a laceration through an organ such as the liver. To a radiologist, it appears as a linear, thin, gray bullet track through the organ. There may be bleeding and some bullet fragments.

            I was looking at a CT scan of one of the mass-shooting victims from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, who had been brought to the trauma center during my call shift. The organ looked like an overripe melon smashed by a sledgehammer, and was bleeding extensively. How could a gunshot wound have caused this much damage?

            The reaction in the emergency room was the same. One of the trauma surgeons opened a young victim in the operating room, and found only shreds of the organ that had been hit by a bullet from an AR-15, a semiautomatic rifle that delivers a devastatingly lethal, high-velocity bullet to the victim. Nothing was left to repair—and utterly, devastatingly, nothing could be done to fix the problem. The injury was fatal.

      1. I assume you're talking to Moderatus since I don't own any guns. 

        A male cousin of mine; an avid hunter; once said "the more guns a guy owns, the shorter his male appendage is."

  2. Good on you, Colorado Legislators and Governor Polis. Some small, but meaningful steps, that the right wing gunheads will undoubtedly lose their minds over.

    After all, the more the angst and grievance pile up, the more donations flow in to those bank accounts.

    1. Yes, I agree.  Let us also punish those who don’t lock up their cars in garages, and fine them again if they don’t report a stolen car.  Oh yeah, let us open up litigation when somebody kills another person with the stolen unsecured car, too.

      Cars kill far more people that guns.  You just aren’t terrified of cars.

      1.  dang,

        You have to insure your car (at least carry liability) in order to drive or to get a license to operate it. Teens have to complete a driver’s training course. People have to drive with an impartial instructor to see if they know traffic laws and safe operation. Drivers have to pass a vision test. Drivers can lose their license if they have too many accidents or tickets.

        And yes, you should definitely report it if your car is stolen – particularly if you are black.

        All we ask is to treat guns the same way.

        1.  I DO have legal coverage for ANY form of self-defense, and so should everybody, including you.

          By the way, there is nothing in the Constitution regarding the infringement of vehicle ownership, but arms are addressed directly.

          What part of "Shall not be infringed," do you not understand?  It limits the government, NOT the people.

           

           

           

          2. What part of "Shall not be infringed," do you not understand? 

            lol

            Just what the Internet needed – another Dunning-Kruger College of Law graduate.

          3. In all of dang's nonsensical posts nowhere did I see any mention of any sort of solution to our national problem of gun violence and mass shootings. His argument is basically people are still going to break the law and shoot people so let's just not do anything, also because I like my guns, and cherry picking parts of the second amendment without any context.

            That's it !  dangs entire argument. Just dumb all over.

      2. You know who doesn’t report a stolen car?

        The guy (usually) who stole it!

        You know who doesn’t report a stolen gun?

        The guy (usually) who stole it — or — the guy (usually) it was stolen from, because it was illegal for him to have that gun for some reason (illegal weapon, prior felony conviction that makes ownership illegal, etc., etc.)!

         

        PS — Ask you insurance agent, if you have one (even that customer rep voice on the phone at The General), how he or she views your not immediately reporting your stolen vehicle?

    2. @kwtree. "After all, the more the angst and grievance pile up, the more donations flow in to those bank accounts."

      You hit the nail on the head.  Polis signed these unenforceable laws to fill the coffers.

       

  4. Congrats on passing another gun-control bill that does not deter, prevent, or stop any violent crimes.  It also does not punish the shooter.  

    It does, however, punish innocent people for literally doing nothing.

    Gold star for pressing your proverbial boot down harder on the necks of your constituents.  

     

     

    1. For some reason, I get as a first impression, that you’re usually a yuge supporter of boots on necks? . . .

      (. . . I mean, so long as those boots are on the right color feet, and the necks are a different color.)

      1. Haha I get it.  You used a Trump reference, a Chauvin reference, and called me a racist all at the same time.  Brilliant.  I applaud how you do that just like everybody else who doesn’t like what I have to say. 

        The “boot on the neck” reference is actually a commonly used analogy on how authoritarians and tyrants rule.  

        For some reason, I get as a first impression, that you speak into an echo chamber, have no conservative friends, exercise your mind and body minimally, read nothing printed on paper, and would have absolutely no idea what to do in a crisis without the government.  

         

        1. I’ll give you this much credit, you had everything nearly correct there, . . .

          . . . right up until the “I get it.”

          PS — more commonly, it’s “heel on the neck.”

            1. Better, you got “gee”and “thanks” right that time.

              Many more than enemies, but I have a few of those too, I suppose . . .

              Wanna’ ask me how many guns I own?

  6. Thank you all for the kind words and advice.  Please rest assured that you have completely convinced me to join your cause.  I will now secure all of my firearms in a safe, because I never would have thought about that previously.

    I will also now report any stolen firearms, because I would have never done that before without the governor telling me to.

    I am so glad that I will now be avoiding a fine.  I was so dumb to think that I could possibly keep my firearms secured without the threat of losing money. 

    I really hope that you can convince all of the criminals to secure theirs as well.  At least they know to tell the police (who we all trust and depend on to keep us safe) when somebody takes their gun.

    While you are at it, can you please tell the criminals that they aren't allowed to use guns in the "gun-free" zones?  They need to know that nobody else will have one, so it wouldn't be fair for them to bring theirs.

    Thank you all for the information.

    Thanks in advance for the comments after I leave to go spread the good word.

          1. “Dang’s” not all bad. Thanks to “Dang,” I got to channel an all time 1964 classic from the late and great country singer, Roger Miller: “Dang Me.”

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