Tuesday’s primary defeat of anti-gun Missouri Gov. Bob Holden should serve as an object lesson for other politicians who place political correctness ahead of the personal safety of their constituents, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) stated.
“Show Me State gun owners showed Bob Holden the door,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “Although they tried to downplay it, both the St. Louis Post Dispatch and Kansas City Star acknowledged that Holden’s veto of concealed carry legislation cost him critical votes, especially in rural Missouri. The governor and his political advisors should have seen this coming the instant that Missouri lawmakers came back to Jefferson City last year to override his arrogant veto.”
CCRKBA Executive Director Joe Waldron added, “It takes examples like Bob Holden to remind anti-gun politicians that they should never underestimate the fury of gun owners, who may not even show as a blip on the political radar until they swoop to the polls. Grassroots activism in the firearms community is alive and well, as Tuesday’s primary vote demonstrated.”
For more than a year, Missouri gun owners have been waiting for this opportunity, the gun rights leaders noted. It was the first time in state history that an incumbent governor was ousted by a challenger from his own party.
“Bob Holden’s veto last year got Missouri gun owners mad,” Gottlieb observed, “and Tuesday, gun owners got even. The governor’s other leadership problems on education, the economy and social issues certainly crippled him, but his anti-gun philosophy was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back.”
“You do not take a position that undermines the personal safety of your constituents, leaving them defenseless against criminals,” Waldron stated. “Politicians who think they can give lip service to gun rights and personal protection, while voting or vetoing otherwise, should take a lesson from Holden’s precedent-setting primary defeat. Gun owners are out there, in the tall grass, and they don’t forget.”