591 img from results.vote.wa.gov

594 img from results.vote.wa.gov

Initiative 594 is one of the most draconian “universal background check” laws anywhere, and it just passed in Washington State. For some examples of how ridiculous this law is, please see here. On the flip side, the passing of I-591 would have caused a direct conflict with I-594 and tied things up in court, while attempting to protect the rights of Washingtonians by preventing firearms confiscation without due process and by preventing WA from enacting firearms regulations stricter than Federal regs. Unfortunately, it has been voted down. The 2014 midterms have not been good for gun rights in Washington State.

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188 COMMENTS

    • We are so screwed. I talked to everyone I know and people I didn’t, to get them to vote no on I-594 and yes on I – 591. Libs in King County screwed us again. I’m PO’d to the max.

      • You’re right. We are fsck’d. Hell, look at the pro-594 ads that were run- “Close the gun show loophole!” with not a peep about what “transfer” actually means. Lying bastards. Worse, anti-594 and pro-591 didn’t run a single commercial pointing any of this out. I feel like my $150 in donations (and donated time) was absolutely wasted. Once again, King Co. and the west side screw up everyone’s life.

        Partial benefit is that Idaho is 15 minutes away, so I can still purchase long guns without registration, and at least for handguns, WA has always had a registration (betcha most of you WA residents didn’t know that! – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_Washington). Hopefully my large contributions to SAF will pay off (they’re based in WA state) and Alan Gura will kick their heinies in court.

        God-damned Birkenstock-wearin’, Highfalutin coffee drinkin’, recycle-or-die!, high-occupancy vehicle lane west-side tree huggers. May an 8.5 quake wipe every one of them from the map!

      • It’s not just King County. If you go look at the results for each county, pretty much every county over 100k is passing 594 by 60%.

        Everyone screwed us on this one!

      • Yep. I’m so pissed off and upset at all the morons out there that didn’t READ the bill and bought into the ads and the lies. So much for my epically fun excursions into the wilderness with friends and firearms for some good law abiding citizen fun. 🙁

        • The school shooting two weeks ago, combined with the massive advertising dollars spent by Bloomberg et al, combined with the unquestioning support of the “mainstream” media, combined with the misleading summary on the actual ballot (http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2014/10/jeremy-s/gunvote-and-wa-ballot-initiative-594/) spelled doom for gun rights in Washington.

          Honestly, a month ago, I thought we were going to win. But we got f*cking crushed. We lost by a 20% margin… And to think that I sacrificed my dual-citizenship with Canada to vote against I-594…

          Our only hope now is the courts (not much hope there)…

          Steve

    • I mean what did you guys expect? You live in one, (if not the MOST liberal POS state) in the union. Oregon, get ready…… I mean come on, so tired of you guys whining that you thought it wouldn’t happen. How much did you volunteer? How much did you contribute? Sure some one of you will say you paid $100 or went to some march, but they are beating you to death in WA and soon to be OR. Just time to wake up, get your neighbors, employees, employers, EVERYONE you know!, to wake up and smell the starbucks…..

        • NO! This is my home, and I will not retreat. I have lived almost my entire adult life here and I will work to hold the line and push back the encroaching authoritarian darkness.

        • NO! This is my home, and I will not retreat. I have lived almost my entire adult life here in Washington and I will work to hold the line and push back the encroaching authoritarian darkness.

      • Oh, please. Don’t talk as if you know the state.

        How soon we forget the progress we made in light of a setback.

        See, Washington’s not this weird commie hive you make it out to be. It’s very purple. That’s why things like this tend to see-saw a bit. One year you get SBRs and suppressors, the next you get this.

        It’ll work out.

        • Washington State is purple? LOL

          So you might as well live on planet Mars. Your state isn’t purple and it hasn’t been for a long, long time. Yes I am familiar with WA and moved away, to another state that starts with a W. ….. Wyoming….. as in Winning. Do you honestly believe WA will get better? This was the year if any for you to turn back the tide. I hope your state does turn against rabid liberalism, but you have to be honest with yourselves, will it? seriously?

          Not unless you help force it to. It won’t just do it on it’s own.

        • WA is liberal on social issues, but not much else. Heck, it still doesn’t have state income tax, and that was repeatedly rejected every time it was brought up as an initiative. I’d classify it as left libertarian.

      • I volunteered almost every weekend for months. I knocked on doors, I hung signs, I stood in front of stores passing out flyers, I spent hours walking through neighborhoods. I volunteered at a booth at a gun show, I talked to people, I attended rallies and meetings, and I talked to my friends and neighbors. Tell me again that I didn’t participate? This whole thing boils down to NRA vs 2AF. The NRA didn’t want to help in Alan Gottliebs backyard, but couldn’t appear to do nothing, so they mailed out some bumper stickers and sat back to watch us drown. Fvck the NRA. I’m done with them.

        I just wonder what 2AF is planning next. Lawsuits? They didn’t do a very good job with this either. Makes me wonder if they realized that they just couldn’t fight the big money, so their plan is to fight it in court.

        • I hate to break it to you, but the SAF won’t fight this. Have you not paid attention to Alan Gottlieb for the last few years? He masturbates to laws like this and wants it crammed down our throats at the Federal level.

        • I didnt see the NRA in this fight at all, at least on the East side of the state… the closest I saw was the local ACE hardware raffling off 8 guns and a safe sponsored by Friends of theNRA.. Im beginning to wonder if they didnt see the battle already lost and Just said F-it..

      • Are you stupid?… look at the map.. the east side is a resounding CONSERVATIVE part of the state.. you dont know what the hell you are talking about.

      • Keri, you are wrong. WA has been a very purple state. But diversity of politics and a taste for reason isn’t what elections are about these days.

        Elections are about those with power using money and media to manipulate votes by identifying and manipulating blocs of voters, usually demographic. Elections are hoops for the globalizer access class to jump through…or circumvent. They will do whatever they can to exploit it, and their dream is to destroy it altogether and replace it with themselves.

        In my own House district in and around Olympia, the Dems shoved boundaries around precisely because we voters consistently voted in ways they (and the GOP) couldn’t take to the bank.

        That purpleness was one of the reasons I and my family chose to make that district our home. Imagine our disappointment to find ourselves rigged into yet another kneejerk Auld Left enclave whose elected officials have contempt for any viewpoint that didn’t come from their party bosses and who care about one thing only: conformity.

        On no fewer than a dozen occasions, in various settings, I heard various Democrats complain that our district was “too independent thinking.”

        In other words, we were too politically diverse. Too prone to thinking for ourselves.

        Remember also that Seattle and the bigger cities are now occupied by many people who fled states they ruined with their “progressive” policies. I know I’ve posted this in the past, but it remains true, sadly enough.

        http://duhprogressive.com/index.php/311-fleeing-californians-ponder-which-state-to-ruin-next

        Until the “people of the gun” learn to confront these people effectively–with cool, dispassionate facts, not victimization-culture-based histrionics and name-calling–we will find rights, and the Constitution, continuing to erode. I don’t know what that involves. I’ve been trying to do what I can at the individual level for about 15 years, but that has its limits. I am thinking hard about what to do next.

        • I don’t see how you can use facts to win over people who base their decisions on emotion and wishful thinking.

    • because facts don’t matter to gun control advocates. they made a big deal trying o tie that shooting. In fact NOTHING in the bill would have had any effect. Dad of shooter is a cop and it was his gun

    • Nor does the fact that liberals/progressives plug their ears and scream LA LA LA LA whenever facts emerge about the genetic/genomic nature of crime. Evolution is only for other species, not for humans.

      I became a Pastafarian minister to find a humorous and friendly way to discuss evolution with creationists and fundamentalists.

      These days I mostly deal with taking population genetics to leftists. They are far more resistant to new information than conservatives.

      http://hbdchick.wordpress.com/tag/crime/

    • Yep, and I can promise you that Bloomberg will push the same referendum in heavily democratic Oregon. This direct democracy voting nonsense you guys have up in OR and WA is bad news.

      • Yeah, initiatives are moronic. I’ve thought that for a long time. People read the ballot description, say “sounds good/bad”, then vote. Total consideration given, at most, ten seconds.

        • Is it any better when they read the list of candidates, look at the (R) or (D) next to the name, say “sounds good/bad”, and vote?

        • There’s a big difference between a mental coin flip on a candidate, which puts someone in office that people who know and care about the issues can work on, and a “whatever, okay” on legislation that will affect the lives of millions.

      • Jared, it is an artifact of the largely Scandinavian/Germanic voter base of our states’ roots. Referendum, recall, and initiatives are a large part of the old Upper Midwest states as well.

        Policies of demographic replacement handed down by globalizers have ensured that the people replacing our founder base cannot replicate the features of our societies. They need these replacement people for their demographic agendas (votes), and the less independent minded the better.

        Nevertheless, the vast majority of people who want to leave their present home nations want to come to societies created by our republic’s founder base. Seems that this “oppression” and “imperialism” is very much to their taste.

        http://thosewhocansee.blogspot.fr/2014/11/theres-something-about-teutonics.html

        • Sorry about your state politics, but down here in Oregon we still have the numbers by far outside of Portland and Eugene to head off such an effort… well at least for now.

        • They conned a lot of people outside of Western Washington. UBC is one of those things that sounds good to people who don’t think much. Makes it perfect for initiatives.

        • Agreed. Even in the most conservative counties 591 was like 50/50 and 594 still usually passed by 5 to 10%. 594 just sounded WAY too “common sense” and totally reasonable in the ballot description, and anyone who hadn’t heard the gun rights groups saying otherwise would never know the truth.

  5. Well hell. Now I kind of regret moving to WA…

    Oh well… now we work on having it repealed or killed in the courts.

    • What is with the large amount of furries migrating there? I left as fast as I could and am glad I did not look back.

        • Don’t blame all of King County – I live there and voted yes 591 and no 594, for all the good it did me. The problem is that most of the counties around Puget Sound live in a bubble. The people have a good income and live in very low crime areas, so they think nothing bad can happen to them.

          The 594 ads were running non-stop with their lies and distortions. All you had to do was look at the text of the two proposals to see there was something very wrong with 594. Unfortunately we live with a lot of stupid people and it is perfectly legal to be stupid and vote.

          So fsck you Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Bloomberg, et al. The cost of living is killing me here and I am moving back to Florida anyway. The nut bag progressives in this area will be the downfall of WA. Puget Sound runs the state like Chicago and New York do in their states. I wish the good people of WA (POTG) all the best, and hope this epic PoS is overturned in the courts.

          Long term we need to have something that gives some power back to the more rural areas of states, so the whole state is not controlled by one or two large urban areas. The Senate provides this counter balance in the Federal government because it is independent of population. I would love to see an initiative to shift the balance of power in the states.

      • It’s what the Left does. Take California.They got themselves elected (politically), pass feel-good laws (because they care), drive taxes sky-high (to pay for those laws), then piss and moan as how expensive it is now, then emigrate to where the taxes are low, and pass yet more laws like the ones they left behind.

        The Left are like cockroaches. They ruin whatever they touch.

        • Like that silly woman in Austin, she got up in some public meeting and was going on about how she had voted for every bond issue, every library expansion, every public improvement to come down the pike–and then launched into a complaint about how she couldn’t afford to live there anymore because the city taxes were too high. Liberals–they really are that stupid.

        • Roaches are survivors. Lefties are actually locust. They devour everything in one area, devestate it and move on to other areas to ruin.

  6. Oh, Washington! What are you become, who were once a great 2A haven?

    This sucks big, hairy bunny pellets, and is grateful for the privilege.

    • First they ruined my beloved home state Colorado and now this. Looking looking at retiring in Arizona.

      • Oh God yes. I move to Arizona after 40 years in Oregon back in February. Best thing I have ever done. Great economy. Job market fantastic if you don’t have to compete with the illegals. Low cost of living but high wages in my field. I do not go a week without seeing at least two OC’ers. I conceal carry every day. I can talk about guns with coworkers without concern that some liberal VP will fire me. The place is beautiful beyond imagination…and yes, the deserts are beautiful too. If too not during the summer (Phoenix), hour drive puts you up in the cooler mountains. Gunsite up the road. Biggest public gun range in the US along the way. The biggest gun shows I have ever seen. Constitutional carry. I could go on and on.

      • AZ has an initiative process and bloomberg stated AZ is next on his target list.

        unless you guys get your shit together ASAP and start strategizing ways to head this off, you’re going to get this draconian crap rammed down your throats as well.

    • State legislature just recently legalized suppressors and SBRs. And our fickle populace did this. I converted at least 7 people to the cause but it’s nothing compared to Bloomberg, Hanauer, Allen, Ballmer, and Gates.

  8. This sucks.
    If you see the percentage of dems winning in different counties, the failures of these measures don’t seem too farfetched. We have some of the highest percent of collage graduates but seems that we fail at civics 101.
    If in this day and age a dem can win with 80% tells you everything you need to know about the level of stupidity in this state. It makes me barf.

    • Seems like a high percentage of college graduates is just a higher number of people going through full indoctrination with a minimal chance of non group think mentality.

      • This strongly republican college student who is in his third year of engineering school at a California liberal arts university strongly disagrees with your broad brush accusations.

        • As a strong conservative finishing grad school at a private college in DFW, I would completely agree with your dislike of the broad brush, however my experiences have unfortunately shown that we are an ever shrinking minority(Id LOVE to be wrong on this) that is quick to be shouted over and lost in the madness. Good on you for fighting the good fight however.

        • Gotta disagree with you. I went to a College in the Southeast. Republicans were in the minority. There were exceptions, but the overwhelming majority of my peers were emotional left leaning sheeple.

    • I think you are on the right track here. If Washington gun owners can find ways to flaunt the law in ways that are both:
      – an open secret; and,
      – relatively low risk of being prosecuted
      then peaceful civil disobedience will lead to angst about the passage of the referendum. This will be a long slow painful experience for PotG in Washington. The people will not soon allow a repeal. Yet, it might send a message to the population at large that PotG will defy laws that are too-far over-the-top. WA, CT, NY . . . as these States begin to recognize that they can pass any law they want but they can’t enforce those laws – – well, then, eventually, something will have to give. What gives might be generalized contempt for the law. It might be that non-gun-owners realize that they can’t have what they want through mere political process.
      There are probably lessons for us PotG about marketing our viewpoint here.

  10. and to pile on…
    Looks like the Libertarians cost us another pro gun Senator.
    Virgina, Senate – 99.53% reporting
    Mark Warner Democrat = 49.07% 1,071,980 – NRA Grade C
    Ed Gillespie Republican = 48.48% 1,059,056 – NRA Grade AQ
    Robert Sarvis Libertarian = 2.45% 53,547

    • Libertarians, which of course means different things to different ‘libertarians,’ really don’t understand that throwing enough votes away doesn’t leave them with more liberty, but less.

      I don’t like it that it is true. But it is true.

      On the bright side, The Senate needed six R’s to gain control, but will probably end up +8.

      I haven’t seen a Ralph comment in the last hour, so I assume he’s either at the party celebration, or broke out a single malt and can no longer type: The Governorships of Massachusetts, Florida, and even Maryland went Republican.

      As for Seattle and 594, suddenly I’m all for more H1B visas, so long as the hiring companies are all in King County.

        • But not nearly enough of them are into “Republican.” They want their guns and hipness too. It’s not that I blame them for the wish. It just rarely happens in reality. On the other hand, maybe they just feel a guns is a very personal item and shouldn’t be shared?

          I think the gun rights movement made a mistake putting up 591, and would have been better off putting up a soft version of 594 and working hard to explain the difference. The courts will sort it out. The worst features of 594 will go, one way or another, I would guess.

        • @ropingdown it may not be the hipness, but the fact that more people closer to the millennial generation dont have any religious pre-conceptions about things like gay marriage and abortion, the social issues dems happily run on knowing they will be supported almost lock step by younger voters.

        • Taylor is pretty much right.

          My parents forced me to go to church when I was younger. I won’t set foot in one the rest of my life and there are an /awful/ lot of people like me.

          Quite a few people in younger generations got mired in religion at a young age, but with the internet and critical thinking are able to emotionally differentiate ourselves from our parents’ generation.

          We were aware and smart enough to know that “True Love Waits” was popular because western parents are squeemish about acknowledging their kids will have sex. We knew (because we actually read the Bible) that God doesn’t care what you wear, and that people dress up for church to keep up with the Joneses.

          Plus you know what? Fair is fair. If I were to denounce gay people based on Biblical reasons, I’d have to do so for myself as well because of my tattoos.

          It won’t be popular to say so, but I think the younger generations are becoming less religious (can’t say one way or another about spiritual) because we recognize the amazing hypocrisy in most organized religion.

        • The ‘yoot’ are much less religious, and much _more_ libertarian.

          Games like COD and the ilk portray guns not as evil, but as tools to accomplish a job.

          I’m not at all surprised IT folks are into guns, network admins (the good ones, anyways) fully understand the concept of being under attack and the need for robust defense.

        • Taylor, TheBear, I agree with what you say. I should point out that my confirmation class long ago was the first to be censured by our Episcopal minister for our apparent disinterest.

          Gay marriage: I would think non-religious libertarians would be against gay marriage, much the way abolitionists were against the spread of slavery to the territories.

          I have an agenda, though. I should be up front: I would like to see the fiscal conservative science-minded liberty loving among the young flock to the Republican party, thereby displacing the “socially conservatives” a bit. I can dream, can’t I? The libertarian 3rd party candidates undercut my hopes.

    • Libertarians didn’t “cost” you anything because you don’t own their vote. Geez the GOP act with libertarian’s votes like the Dems act like with libertarian’s dollars, and my response is the same in both instances; Just because you didn’t earn it doesn’t mean anything was stolen from you. Work harder for it next time.

      • A libertarian who is almost a democrat is fine with me. A libertarian who is almost a Republican is throwing away his or her vote. That has proven true election after election. But hey, far be it from me to critique the politics of Washington State. I assume they got what they wanted. At least tonight I can go to sleep somewhat confident that the U.S. Supreme Court isn’t going to gut the 2nd amendment despite Washington State, not because of it.

        • A libertarian who votes for a republican like Mitt Romney is throwing away his vote. It’s rebelling against the mainstream RINOs that got the republican party to shift the way it did recently.

        • If libertarians who lean conservative joined the republican party in enough numbers to affect the primary, where small numbers of loud and determined people can make the difference in which candidate reaches the main election, we wouldn’t have to hold our nose and vote for Republicans like Romney. Then we would all win.

        • Libertarians aren’t throwing away their vote. The Republican party, which could have had that vote if it wasn’t so insanely reactionary on its social policies, is throwing away their vote.

        • “A libertarian who is almost a republican?” What is that supposed to mean? I am a fairly conservative individual, but I identify with almost nothing Republicans actually do when they get into power. Not just what they seem to talk about on the campaign trail. Throw us under the bus if it makes you feel better, but at least we libertarians stand for something, and we aren’t inclined to think, out of some sense of perverted tribalism, that this chief won’t abuse us as much as the last one because of the color shirt he’s wearing.

        • I’m a Libertarian (or close to it) and because there aren’t any viable 3rd party candidates yet, I just don’t vote. 🙂

          I refuse to choose between a giant douche and a turd sandwich. I will take my marbles and go home.

    • Tell socons to suck it up for a change and put forward a candidate that appeals more to libertarians, and you’ll get their vote. Republicans need to treat socons like the Democrats treat blacks: take them for granted in order to reach out to independents. Field a libertarian candidate who believes in individual rights and fiscal discipline and dare socons to stay home.

      • “put forward a candidate that appeals more to libertarians, and you’ll get their vote.”
        Why don’t libertarians primary out the socons or RINOs? Primaries have extremely low turnout which makes it easier to get defeat any candidate. Why can’t libertarians “take a stand” anytime other than the November elections? If libertarian candidates can’t win a primary, how are they going to win an election?
        I like individual liberties and financial discipline as much as anybody. It was Republicans in the Senate that stopped universal background checks at the Federal level. Libertarians pretending there is no difference between Reps and Dems fooling themselves as they “make a stand” against everybody and moan about everybody.
        The key is to get the candidate you dislike the least in office, then put up somebody better next time. The put up somebody else better after that. Swing for the fences and strike out every time. Oh, and the socons already stayed home for Romney. Daring them to do it again guarantees a dem win.

    • I’d like to put it the other way….the hipsters and latte liberals of King County sold it to Bloomberg.

      I predict that 594 as written will prove so onerous that illegal gun transfers will flourish, and gun crime in the Seattle MSA will increase. It is the natural result, disrespect for the law, now rationalized more than ever by the criminal class and other sketchy people.

    • I’ve repeatedly tried to contact robert farago or dan zimmerman to write about how dangerous this initiative tactic is. So far, crickets. TTAG could help warn but sadly it seems they won’t.

      bottom line is, the NRA needs to start coordinating big time with regional pro-gun groups. it doesn’t matter how much influence you have in congress or state legislatures when you’re fighting initiatives.

      • It’s all well and good to get the pro gun groups organized, but part of the fight has to come by brining the fence straddlers into the fold, at least ideologically. I don’t mean they have to come out loving guns, but they need to understand these laws won’t do a darn thing. Fact is that most voters are ignorant, and they tend to vote for something on every line as opposed to refraining when they don’t know anything.

        • bringing the fence straddlers into the fold won’t happen without NRA support.

          NRA support won’t happen until members start demanding that the NRA start taking this initiative threat seriously.

          and that won’t happen until the gun press start warning readers about how bad this initiative threat really is.

          it starts here, or rather, it doesn’t. because TTAG can’t be bothered.

        • It is very unlikely that the NRA is not aware of the danger – they are neither stupid nor uninformed.

  13. Even worse, a universal background check bill was voted down in the state legislature a few months after the Newtown shooting. That one was much more reasonable in comparison. It had specific protections against the state keeping any firearm transfer information, whereas I-594 actually requires a firearms registry in the state. It had background check exemptions for CPL holsters, whereas I-594 has almost no exemptions and treats a “transfer” as any touching of a firearm that isn’t yours (see my post linked in the 2nd sentence of this one for examples). Basically, we were happy to avoid less bad but ended up with extremely bad instead.

    Not. Good.

    • That was Alan Gottlieb’s point, and it has proven to be valid in WA. We will know within a couple of years whether it is also valid nationally.

      • gottlieb was writing about this exact scenario many years ago. gottlieb worked to try to make HB1588 a reasonable bill, the NRA scuttled it and gun owners called him a traitor.

        now gun owners will be wishing they had the entirely reasonable HB1588 instead of draconian 594. they should be calling gottlieb prescient instead of a traitor.

        the bill they are trying to inflict on NV is even more draconian than 594. if the NRA’s support in WA is any indication, it will sail through unopposed as well.

        • No we “gun owners” won’t wish we had one bad law instead of another bad law.

          That’s so completely illogical to the point of being ridiculous.

          Fight ’em. That’s how you win. Yes, there are setbacks, but you don’t win by giving the enemy what they want.

          Unconditional surrender. Or defeat. That’s the only choice we should allow the gun grabbers to make.

        • I was against it, as I’m more of a constitutional ownership kind of a bloke and therefore wanted to see the law and any like it fail, but it wasn’t that bad. It actually got rid of WA’s current handgun registration and created penalties for any gov’t entity attempting to retain 4473 or other transfer data. Then it totally exempted CPL holders from requiring a background check for private transfers, and private parties could do a private transfer with no paperwork whatsoever, when and wherever they chose, as long as they checked each other’s CPLs. As WA is a shall issue state and it’s fairly easy, quick (30 days), and painless to get a CPL, this means the “universal background check” process can be avoided for anyone who wants to avoid it. You could even say it would have encouraged people to get carry permits. As-is, I have bought and sold dozens of firearms private party in WA State and nearly every private seller demands to see a buyer’s CPL anyway just as a means of ensuring they’re ‘legit,’ even though there’s no legal requirement of this.

          Basically, in the realm of UBC laws, this one was the best I’ve seen in that it required the background checks for people who hadn’t already been vetted (non CPL holders) but it also created a lot of “wins” for 2A rights.

          I was still against it. Still am. In hindsight, though, given a choice between the two it would have been preferable by leaps and bounds. Had that one passed, 594 would not have come up. I’d still rather have neither, but that ship sailed…

          I do hope this gets worked out in court and most or all of 594 is thrown out as creating overdue burden and criminalizing what should be totally legal behavior!

    • We’ll see how this one pans out. It could easily turn out to be too confusing and unenforceable to keep, like the wonkiest parts of the SAFE act.

      • A couple of craziest provisions may get improved, like the one that if you have an over-18 child living with you, he or she apparently can’t borrow your gun to take to the range, but the rest of the new law will remain in place.

  15. Boobus Amerikanus wins again!

    Actually the “law” is unenforceable, but this is just the beginning. Also, not all the votes have been counted yet.

  16. Yeah, this outcome was nearly inevitable from day one. Washington has started the long slide down the road to California.

  17. So reality is out of roughly 4.3 mil eligible voters in Washington State, there are 703k (16.26%) of the population who are confirmed Nazi’s, 703,000/4,300,000 = 16.26%, got it!

  18. I gotta imagine this one’ll find its way into the courts. Too many pieces of bad policy all at once will attract plaintiffs and lawyers like s*** attracts flies.

  21. We had a guy canvassing near our poll station in NV for a similar bill to be on next election. I’m embarrassed to say I got into an argument with him… You can’t discuss anything with stupid… Luckily the local sheriff ran him off later that day 🙂

    • If WA is any indication, the NRA will let it fly through unopposed. I’ve seen the text of that bill and it’s even more draconian than I-594.

    • 30 days after today (11/4) unless it was a close contest and then it’s 30 days after certification. Your timer has started…

  23. Sorry to see this. We got some good nationally and in my state of Illinois. I stiil don’t see how this could be enforced.

  24. IIRC, WA state initiatives can be modified by the legislature after 2 years, so my thought is that when 2 years have passed and nothing good has come of the law, the NRA twists some arms and scores some votes, with the threat of what happened in Colorado helping to get the message across down in Olympia.

    • they can be amended under 2 years with a 2/3 majority in both houses. would require support from the NRA though.

  25. Just watched the 11 news, here in Oregon. All I can say is: When they pry my cold dead hands off the barrel!

  26. I hope the gun owners of WA use the next 30 days to swap guns in legal private transfers with as many people as possible, and completely screw up the state registry.

  27. “The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects
    from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the
    reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal
    principles to be applied by the courts. One’s right to life, liberty,
    and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and
    assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote;
    they depend on the outcome of no elections.”
    — Justice Robert H. Jackson
    (1892-1954), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
    Source: West Virginia Board of Education vs. Barnette, 1943

  28. By the way, haven’t we been told all along that support for background checks was 90 percent or something? Looks like they only got 60 percent, and that with being able to outspend the opponents by a large margin, perhaps by five to one, if not worse.

  29. Why won’t TTAG write anything about how grave a threat this initiative process is? It’s not just WA or OR. About half the US states have an initiative process or something close to it.

    This is a big problem and TTAG is doing a disservice to its readers and all gun owners by ignoring it.

    • You can blame TTAG all you want, but you’d do better to blame the readers and 2A activists in general for failing to see the forest for the trees and to think strategically.

      More of these are going to come in 2016, and they’re going to pass. I said that back in April about 594 and I was dismissed and called a fool. Now the same people are whining about the “nazi’s” who passed this law as though that’s somehow a logical reaction. It’s really, really hard to convince an average person on the street that background checks are bad.

      If we lose, it won’t be because of Bloomberg… It will be because of us.

      • yep, if we lose it will be because of idealistic idiots like JR_in_NC who think that just digging their heels in will defeat these initiatives.

        gun owners do need to start thinking strategically, and TTAG needs to start writing about it.

  30. Left coast fails again I suppose, sadly this is a common thought process among quite a few other places as well. I can only imagine(and am quite curious) what the sheriffs and LEOs in WA that said this is completely un-enforceable are going to be doing once it goes into effect. Good luck to all WA residents and those in adjacent states that the sickness will spread to first.

  31. This is such a and sad day. I am so pissed! The only thing I can hope for is they fight this in the courts. But right now i’m eating on bitter pie!

  32. As soon as I saw the headline for “School Shooting in Washington”, it was clear the die was cast.The trouble with the phrase “background check” is that in modern life you need one to do virtually anything these days.

    Want a job at Burger King?Have to authorize a criminal background check. Want to work at a non-profit or around kids? BG check please. Activate service utilities? Gotta pass a background check. Well, not really, but one sees the problem.Given that we need background checks to do virtually anything important in society, it just sounds rational to the voters that we’d want that too when someone is buying or receiving a deadly weapon, especially in a day and age where friggin Pizza Hut won’t hire someone without it.

    To overcome that takes marketing, which is a problem for us because every media channel in the country backs the enemy.

    • Do you want to distribute your firearms collection to your children and grandchildren before you die? They better pass a background check.

    • “when someone is buying or receiving a deadly weapon”

      The biggest issue with 594 wasn’t even the universal background check part, but that it hoodwinked people into believing that it was just talking about background checks on ownership transfers. That is not the case. “Transfer” is defined so broadly as to be basically any time one person touches another person’s firearm. If you and I go to the woods where I prefer to shoot, I cannot even hand you my gun for you to try out for five minutes. We can’t share a shotgun for target shooting. If we’re in my house, you can’t touch one of my firearms just to look at it. If you pick it up, that’s a transfer. We would have had to go to an FFL, do the background check, pay the transfer fees, transfer ownership to you, then do that all again in reverse. Just for you to pick it up on private property. And the State would have records of this. And may be charging Use Tax for every transfer.

  33. Doesn’t look like its going to be good for gun rights in CT or CO as their gov’s look to be on their way to reelection…

    • Yea, but by the skin of their teeth though. Not quite the majority victories they where hoping for. Besides, theirs always run off elections

  34. I moved away from the left coast in February. Best decision I have ever made. I live in Arizona now, and you cannot pay me enough to move back. I don’t know about WA, but Oregon is in a death spiral. Economy, fundamental freedoms, and you name it, it is all repressed. Perhaps it is time for freedom loving Americans to retreat from the NW to form a stronger opposition in the flyover states.

    • AZ is next on bloomberg’s list of targets. you have an initiative process too, and they will use it to ram this crap down your throats as well.

      either start demanding that the NRA take this initiative threat seriously, or prepare to move to another state, again.

  35. All this proves is you can buy an initiative. Money spreads lies. Thats the simple fact we lost. If I-591 had a few million collar contributions it would have been a much different race.

    Thats the real damning thing of 594 passing. It proves if you can solidly outspend your opponent you have a good chance.

  36. The problem we face is that this sort of thing has bumper-sticker appeal. We know the arguments against background checks.

    Unfortunately the low-info voters do not.

    All they see is that this, unlike other gun control measures like mag/feature bans, APPEARS to attack the bad guys’ ability to get their hands on a weapon. Since that’s a goal that “even the NRA” applauds (Is the NRA still bragging about passing NICS in the early 90s?) it’s surprising this didn’t pass by a larger margin.

  37. I cant believe this…. the split was right down the cascades.. except for spokane and the liberals at WSU…I want to puke my guts out…

  39. I probably will comply with background checks if I sell a firearm. I’ll make the purchaser pay the fees and taxes. I’ll never comply when shooting with trusted friends and family. Forcing us to fork over all that money, just to shoot each other’s firearms, is bullshit. NEVER!!

    • I have friends that swap, trade and buy privately..and I just dont see such a long drawn out process being part of the equation when a couple of guys at the range are wanting to trade ownership.. I also see Idaho’s free nickel newspaper getting swamped with people living in border counties and cities, who just want to buy and sell used,

  40. Looking at the county-by-county results, I-591 really jumped out at me as a perfect example of the “Puget Sound vs the rest of Washington” story. Statewide, it lost by 109,375 votes. In King County alone, it lost by 119,364 votes. In almost every county outside Puget Sound, I-591 passed, often by a large margin, but it’s not nearly enough to overcome the population advantage.

    • Which is exactly why they are now turning to ballot initiatives instead of going through state legislatures. They have imposed the will of the big city on everyone else. Just like in New York.

  41. Although an onerous piece of legislation, it’s essentially unenforceable. Does anyone honestly believe that shooting buddies are going to be arrested and prosecuted for loaning a rifle during hunting season? Or that loaning your niece a pistol is going to get you a misdemeanor ticket? First, unless an LEO actually witnesses the transfer, what proof is there that a transfer even occurred, without a current registry of who-owns-what. Second, even if it happens, what’s the likelihood of prosecution – particularly since the sheriffs have no interest in this law anyway.

    The day after the 30 round mag ban went into effect in Colorado, dozens of activists descended on the state capital and freely passed mags around – none were arrested. Maybe the same thing needs to happen in Olympia – a mass protest of guns being passed around in a big circle. How many arrests do you think would be made?

  42. Two observations. As a Washington resident, I have noticed a lot more Californians, fairly well off, moving to the area. The politics are bound to change with that influx. Secondly, the NRA is not made up of idiots at the leadership level. They have very sharp political and legal minds there, I am wondering if they did not bother trying to oppose what they already saw was a losing battle at the ballot box, and will instead look at Washington as a test case to get onerous legislation like this changed in the courts and legislature. Groups like Bloomberg and Everytown and MDA picked Washington as the perfect testbed for a god-awful initiative. And I am willing to bet that the NRA sees it as the perfect testbed for fighting in an arena after the election with a much better chance of success now.

    • Yes this just wreaks of a Spaghetti test. What worries me is that they can learn from their mistakes here and keep spreading these around, but refined and even more damaging. Time will tell. WA and the NRA have a good chance of shredding this eventually, but until the beast is brought down all together, it will be a back and forth battle for a long time.

  43. So, why did Bloomberg write such a nasty law? It’s not clear all of its provisions can survive a lawsuit. Is his real goal to scare us into passing more “reasonable” UBC laws and feeling happy how we “fooled” him? Or is he really hoping to kill the gun culture by outlawing letting anyone shoot your gun even in your presence?

  44. So, what you’re telling me is: even in a blue state, UBCs only managed to get 60% of the vote. In other words: the 90%-support-universal-background-checks is proven to be nonsense.

    Call it a silver lining (well, if you live outside of WA).

    • it is an interesting data point for certain. $10m still only managed 60%. There is hope for NV, if the NRA doesn’t fuck it up there too.

  45. I was under the impression that the law forbade one person even just picking up another’s gun, but a friend of mind just posted this. At best, this is a confusing law:

    You are incorrect sir.
    from this page:
    http://wagunresponsibility.org/about-594/
    Reasonable Exceptions – background checks are not required for:
    Gifts between immediate family members
    Antiques and relics
    Temporary transfers for self-defense
    Loans for lawful hunting or sporting activities

    From this page: http://ballotpedia.org/Washington_Universal_Background…
    Certain other temporary transfers of a firearm would also not require a background check. These include temporary transfers between spouses, and temporary transfers for use at a shooting range, in a competition, or for performances. A temporary transfer to a person under age eighteen for hunting, sporting, or education would not require a background check. Other temporary transfers for lawful hunting also would not require a background check.

    Finally, from this page, the actual text of the bill, section 4.f lists an exclusion that covers exactly this event: http://sos.wa.gov/…/elect…/initiatives/FinalText_483.pdf

    (f) The temporary transfer of a firearm (i) between spouses or
    domestic partners; (ii) if the temporary transfer occurs, and the
    firearm is kept at all times, at an established shooting range
    authorized by the governing body of the jurisdiction in which such
    range is located; (iii) if the temporary transfer occurs and the
    transferee’s possession of the firearm is exclusively at a lawful
    organized competition involving the use of a firearm, or while
    participating in or practicing for a performance by an organized group
    that uses firearms as a part of the performance; (iv) to a person who
    is under eighteen years of age for lawful hunting, sporting, or
    educational purposes while under the direct supervision and control of
    a responsible adult who is not prohibited from possessing firearms; or
    (v) while hunting if the hunting is legal in all places where the
    person to whom the firearm is transferred possesses the firearm and
    the person to whom the firearm is transferred has completed all
    training and holds all licenses or permits required for such hunting,
    provided that any temporary transfer allowed by this subsection is
    permitted only if the person to whom the firearm is transferred is not
    prohibited from possessing firearms under state or federal law;
    Washington Alliance for Gun Responsibility » About Initiative Measure No. 594
    This measure would apply the currently used criminal and public safety background checks by licensed dealers to all firearm sales and transfers, including gun show and online sales, with specific exceptions.
    WAGUNRESPONSIBILITY.ORG

    • (f) (ii) appears not to cover a gun you bring from home to the range, only the guns kept at the range all the time. The law does seem to preclude taking a friend, or even your own child over 18, to the range and letting them shoot your gun. And as the range has to be “established”, not plinking together at a random sand pit either.

    • You miss the point all together. This is a law. This is a law that presumes to tell you when, where and how we will use and purchase a firearm. It will asks(tells) us to beg for permission and charges us to do so. It is control. It is infringement. It is a false protection. It is anti-liberty and evil. It is a lie. It negates the 2nd amendment and bleeds us. It should not be tolerated and any who support it is an enemy of the people and their constitution.

      Nous Defions

      • I don’t miss the point at all. I am opposed to ALL gun laws! I was simply looking for some ammunition to shoot back at my friend. Your post didn’t help.

    • You are right to question Jay and not incorrect. Your concern is rational. This is how 594 is not “simple” as was promoted. At the end of the day, time frames and words like “transfer” require clarity. In general you are left to register everything all the time to defer risk and assure you are adhering to the law. This is one of the “bad” parts of 594 and what everyone has been up in arms about. Do not accept being told you are incorrect, on the contrary, thinking and questioning is a sign of intellect. Why do you think WACOPS did not support 594? Why would the people who sign on to carry firearms, protect the public, not support an Initiative which professes to detour the criminal?

  46. I just talked to my sister about this. While getting his coffee this morning my husband had commented irritably how there are too many stupid people on Washington and she wanted to know why he thought that. It came out that she and her husband had both voted yes to both laws. Her understanding of the law was that it was another methods of keeping guns from criminals, so obviously it was a good idea and honestly why do you need to go thru hoops to take guns from criminals? To me it boils down to misinformation. The law is a lie and was presented with lies like the ACA, so what people thought they were voting for and what the law actually does is a different thing.
    Obviously this is a discussion that should have taken place before she voted:(
    But for the general public, telling the truth doesn’t seem to work. I don’t know how to combat such things on a broad scale.

  47. This sounds like a wake-up call to me.

    Look for more efforts to get benign-sounding, incremental gun restrictions passed through ballot initiatives. These initiatives will have too many subtleties for most voters to understand how they restrict rights.

    I would vote against any ballot initiative restricting gun rights. At the same time, a law that requires background checks for private sales (not loans or gifts) would not give me much heartburn, as long as the seller can perform the background check himself. Such a law shifts some power from the government to the people.

    From a voting populace standpoint, I think opposing background checks for private sales might already be a lost cause nationally. Does it make sense for gun owners to consider something like allowing seller-handled checks for private sales in exchange for repeal of or major modifications to something like the gun free school zones act? Or does it make more sense to always oppose any form of restriction? I don’t know the answers.

    For what it’s worth, I don’t see the point in answering the questions with some variation of “the right to keep and bear arms is absolute.” The United States government and the governments of the several states have never, at any point in their history, treated any right as absolute, and they never will. We can say all day long that they should, but that’s just sound and fury. I think the answer lies in figuring out what the best, on-the-ground strategy for preserving and expanding gun rights is.

  48. So answer me this: What prevents two Washington residents from just going across the state line to Idaho or Oregon and making the sale and transfer there? If the sale or transfer occurrs outside the state of Washington, the state does not have any juristiction. There is no provistion for reporting a sale between residents if it does not occur in the state
    Another question: If I fly out of the state with a rifle for a hunt In another state, am I violating the I-594 when the airline counter person in washington takes my rifle (in a TSA approved case) and puts it in the baggage hold of the aircraft? I see no exemption as the law is written that allows this, would that be considered a transfer?

    • What prevents two Washington residents from just going across the state line to Idaho or Oregon and making the sale and transfer there?

      What prevents them from doing it in their own living room in Washington?

      Nothing.

    • You’re smarter than the average bear Wally1. Pretty screwed up what the wealthy extremist’s can pull off isn’t it? Never forget what they did.

    • Nothing Kyle. And the label itself could be expanded to absorb everything short of a wrist-rocket. In fact this likely the beginning of a movement to eradicate firearms from the citizens. So you are right on the money.

  50. Frankly I’m offended to realize how many hysterical reactive emotionally driven people live in my vicinity (Kitsap County). I honestly had no idea.

    Spending 10 mil to garner votes in a lopsided contest does not welcome bragging rights. I suspect what occurred is many voted no on both out of confusion and frustration which helped support the yes 594 side. There is every reason to suspect this was a studied and well drawn expected part of the strategy. The carpet-brainwashing worked.

    The reality is now there are a group of billionaires who now know how to pass nearly anything they want, the issues need not be limited to firearms.

    One more thing; the criminals are now clear on where not to acquire a firearm.

  51. I am sorry for all the gun control freaks in Soviet Washington. and as for us gun lovers in no/can county, i think we will just have to say no to the new bull . if not, see you in court and I bet gates will get sick of the donations to the courts to fight these thousands of new cases.

  52. Good! Hopefully those gun-wielding lunatics transferring their guns without background checks will see prison time.

    Gun owners *are* the problem with this country.

    • [Citation Needed]

      Given that lawful gun owners commit crime at a rate an order of magnitude less-frequently than even law enforcement officers, I’d say your assertion is not only specious, it is absurd on its face.

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