BELLEVUE, WA – The Washington State Patrol Troopers Association has announced its opposition to Initiative 1639, bringing a solid line of law enforcement professionals standing with Evergreen State rights activists against the extremist gun control measure, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms has learned.
WSPTA joins the Washington State Sheriffs Association, Washington Council of Police & Sheriffs and the Washington State Law Enforcement Firearms Instructors Association, which earlier announced their opposition to the measure. Together these organizations represent thousands of troopers, sheriff’s deputies and municipal police officers, noted CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb.
“We cannot underestimate the importance of having all of these law enforcement groups lining up with the Constitution, and the citizens they serve and protect,” Gottlieb observed. “Initiative 1639 is 30-pages of extremism disguised as ‘gun safety.’ It won’t make schools or communities safer, but it will treat more than a million Evergreen State gun owners like criminals.”
In a press release obtained by CCRKBA Tuesday, WSPTA President Jeff Merrill noted, “Local, County and State law enforcement officers from across Washington are united in opposition to I-1639. Concerns include the inability to enforce ‘feel good’ provisions within the proposal. Unenforceable gun control laws are not effective. Individual accountability, stiff penalties for firearms violations and consistent, swift court sentences are far better deterrents than adding additional restrictions to law abiding firearms owners.”
“Jeff Merrill could not have said it better,” Gottlieb stated. “I-1639 is a draconian scheme to saddle Washington residents with the most onerous restrictions in the nation. It would deny young adults the ability to exercise their rights under the state and federal constitutions while forcing gun owners to surrender their medical privacy.
“Washington State’s establishment media has steadfastly ignored the growing law enforcement opposition to I-1639,” he added. “That opposition doesn’t fit with the media’s anti-gun agenda. The media doesn’t want voters to know where the men and women of law enforcement stand because it would doom this extreme measure. I-1639 is bad public policy that substitutes empty promises for real solutions to violent crime.”