Attorney Tom DeVore, last election cycle’s Republican candidate for Illinois Attorney General, has raised questions about the state’s new gun registry. He’s indicated that the governor might use an executive order to demand surrender of those guns following a “mass shooting.”
DeVore is known in the Land of Lincoln for securing a temporary restraining order blocking the so-called Protect Illinois Communities Act (PICA) for his plaintiffs. His recent Facebook post has people talking.
Some media outlets have picked up on it as well, including WICS . . .
A Facebook post making the rounds is raising questions about the assault weapons ban registry and how the Governor might use it.
Thomas DeVore, an attorney with the Silver Lake Group, posted on Facebook that Governor Pritzker could issue an executive order declaring an emergency should there be another mass shooting. That post has been shared almost 450 times.
DeVore’s post says “His executive order would be that all owners of the banned weapons who are on the registry would have to turn them over to the government.” “He told us he heard this information from colleagues who “have the ability to understand what’s going on within the inner circles of legislative leaders and the governor’s office.”
DeVore could not tell us which colleagues he was referring to.
“It was a phone call that I had with them a couple of days before I made that post.” “The conversation developed, as I’ve been told is that the governor’s people have already drafted some language for an executive order under the Illinois Emergency Management Agency Act,” he said.
We reached out to the Governor’s office. They told us the post was “Unequivocally false”
DeVore’s post concerning the governor exploring the issuance of an executive order to seize registered scary black guns falls right in line with another leak to Guns Save Life, grassroots gun rights organization in Illinois where I’m executive director.
Last fall, a person inside the Pritzker administration shared with us that the governor’s team was working with legislators to welcome new legislation to “close the existing owner loophole.” Those were their words. The language would be placed into a shell bill in the aftermath of a high-profile mass casualty incident, especially if the incident took place in Illinois.
The governor would welcome that kind of legislation, and legislative leaders would fast-track it through the General Assembly and pass it into law in the crisis atmosphere after a high-profile incident. It would happen just like it did with the original PICA law last January. That bill went from a “gut and replace” amendment to the governor signing it into law in the space of about 72 hours.
The proposed legislation that was leaked to GSL would give owners who registered their guns a period of time — 90 days was mentioned — to surrender their firearms or face felony charges. Those who failed to surrender their registered guns would also risk law enforcement officers — likely the Illinois State Police — knocking on their door demanding the guns.
DeVore’s post suggests that Team Pritzker is exploring multiple avenues to grab those registered firearms.
What would happen to the 99% of Illinois gun owners who didn’t register their firearms ahead of the January 1 deadline? No word about them. No doubt sooner or later, they’ll face more legislation to make their non-compliance even more illegal-er.