On Tuesday's New Day show on CNN, co-host Brianna Keilar devoted a segment to trying to undermine a soon-to-be law in Texas that will allow legal gun owners to carry concealed handguns without a permit.
The show allowed Democratic state legislator Joe Moody a forum to argue against the law and spread misinformation about current gun laws.
As is typical on the liberal news network, the three-hour CNN show did not include any conservative guest to argue in favor of the new law.
Shortly after 7:00 a.m. Eastern, Keilar teased the segment by absurdly tying it to the new voting law in Texas: "And it will soon be easier to wave a gun around in Texas than it will be to vote -- the new law that comes as America sees 13 mass shootings in the past few days alone."
At 8:44 a.m.. co-host John Berman set up the segment by recalling the surge in shootings over the past year, as well as over the weekend, and then showed an NRA ad in which Louisiana Republican Senator John Kennedy talked up gun rights. Berman then mocked the ad:
Aside from the smooth jazz, soft porn music there, you saw it right. With a wave of gun violence, potentially deadly weapons, no problem. ... Just four months after the armed insurrection at the Capitol and the aforementioned mass shootings, more states are making it easier to buy, own and carry firearms without a license. In Texas, Republicans just passed a new bill that allows anyone over the age of 21 to carry a concealed handgun without obtaining a license or training.
Keilar soon informed viewers of the new concealed carry law in Texas, and then, after bringing aboard Moody, began by suggesting that the El Paso mass shooting was somehow an argument against allowing more concealed carry freedom:
We saw the 2019 shooting in Walmart that was just terrible, and the nation watched as that happened, and yet here we are. Texas lawmakers have approved allowing people to carry handguns without a license and the background check and training that go with it. What do you think? What is that going to look like on the ground in Texas as far as people walking around carrying handguns?
Moody began by wrongly claiming that Texas does not have background checks even though licensed gun dealers in every state are required to do them.
He then contradicted himself by admitting that the 2019 Midland-Odessa mass shooter, Seth Ator, failed a background check, before the Texas Democrat spread more misinformation by claiming that the man who sold Ator his murder weapon was not legally required to do background checks:
Three weeks after the tragedy in El Paso, you had another shooter in the Midland-Odessa area who went to go try to buy a gun, failed a background check, walked out of that store, and went to a private sale -- because there's no background checks on private sales here in Texas -- and got a weapon and then murdered people. So, in the face of those tragedies, we've essentially compounded the problem.
In fact, the seller was acting illegally as an unlicensed gun dealer, and should have done a background check. He was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison after the shooting led to his illegal gun dealing business being discovered by authorities.
Regarding the El Paso mass shooting, no one bothered to point out that, if more customers had been legally allowed to concealed carry, someone might have cut the gunman's rampage short. And the laws limiting concealed carry obviously did not prevent the gunman from bringing his gun into Walmart.
This one-sided free advertising for gun control activists was sponsored in part by Voltaren. Click on the link to let them know what you think.
Transcript follows. Click "expand" to read more.
CNN
New Day
May 25, 2021
7:01 a.m. Eastern
BRIANNA KEILAR: And it will soon be easier to wave a gun around in Texas than it will be to vote -- the new law that comes as America sees 13 mass shootings in the past few days alone.
(...)
8:44 a.m. Eastern
JOHN BERMAN: So far this year, more than 7,500 people have died from gun violence in America. That's a 23 percent increase over 2020. The nation seeing more than 230 mass shootings this year, including at least 13 in just the past few days. It's only May. It's May. There's more of 2021 remaining than has already passed, and yet, this is the message that a Republican Senator and the NRA have in this climate.
SENATOR JOHN KENNEDY (R-LA) (in NRA ad): Folks, I believe that love is the answer, but you ought to own a handgun just in case.
BERMAN: Aside from the smooth jazz, soft porn music there, you saw it right. With a wave of gun violence, potentially deadly weapons, no problem. Spellcheck, that's another matter. Just four months after the armed insurrection at the Capitol and the aforementioned mass shootings, more states are making it easier to buy, own and carry firearms without a license. In Texas, Republicans just passed a new bill that allows anyone over the age of 21 to carry a concealed handgun without obtaining a license or training. Supporters call it a "constitutional carry." Critics, including law enforcement, say it makes the streets more dangerous. But Texas governor Greg Abbott will sign it anyway.
GOVERNOR GREG ABBOTT (R-TX) (audio from interview): I support it, and I believe it should reach my desk, and we should have constitutional carry in Texas. (editing jump) This is something that 20 other states already have adopted.
KEILAR: Now, Texas will join five other states that have all passed some form of permitless carry legislation just this year. This despite the fact that a majority of Texans -- some 59 percent -- oppose unlicensed carry according to a University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll. But the proposal was far more popular with Republicans -- 56 percent of them support unlicensed carry while 85 percent of Democrats oppose it. And now, because of this, it is getting easier to own and carry a handgun in Texas even as it gets harder to vote there.
Joining me now, Texas state representative Joe Moody. Sir, thank you so much for being with us. You represent an area that has seen some of the worst of this violence, some of the most horrific. We saw the 2019 shooting in Walmart that was just terrible, and the nation watched as that happened, and yet here we are. Texas lawmakers have approved allowing people to carry handguns without a license and the background check and training that go with it. What do you think? What is that going to look like on the ground in Texas as far as people walking around carrying handguns?
STATE REPRESENTATIVE JOE MOODY (D-TX): Permitless carry is bad policy, but it compounds the problem in our law now. We don't have background checks -- we don't have safe storage laws -- we don't have really basic safety measures in our law. And so when you add permitless carry to the top of that, it exacerbates the problem that already exists in Texas, which is people that shouldn't have access to weapons now can do so and we have no -- we have no safety valves whatsoever.
Three weeks after the tragedy in El Paso, you had another shooter in the Midland-Odessa area who went to go try to buy a gun, failed a background check, walked out of that store, and went to a private sale -- because there's no background checks on private sales here in Texas -- and got a weapon and then murdered people. So, in the face of those tragedies, we've essentially compounded the problem.
KEILAR: So if someone is a felon -- if, for instance, they have a restraining order against them or they, you know, they have issues as far as domestic assault has gone, they're not supposed to be carrying a weapon. What is to stop them from basically opening -- openly carrying a handgun?
MOODY: In the law as it is -- the law that's being sent to the governor, it says, if you're not supposed to have one, you can't have one, but there's no enforcement mechanism. There's zero. So the moment that we will find out that someone shouldn't have had that weapon is the moment in which loved ones will be -- are going to be called and told that their relative, their spouse, their child, their parent is dead. That's when they'll find out that that person shouldn't have had a weapon. That's the tragedy that's waiting to come to the next city in Texas.
KEILAR: Law enforcement is concerned about this bill. They're concerned that this is going to endanger people and endanger officers. They will be able to, you know, if they see someone openly carrying a handgun, they'll be able to question them. That is a provision that stayed in this bill. Does that give you any pause that there is a modicum of safety in this bill?
MOODY: No, that's, I mean, that's really just window dressing in the bill. And it's, you know, it's really funny when you juxtapose it with other bills where, you know, everyone is defending the police and not defunding the police, right, we have those bills going on in Texas today. We heard one on the floor yesterday -- "We respect law enforcement -- we want to make sure that they have the tools in their tool belt to be able to solve the crimes of the day -- make sure they're not attacked." Yet when law enforcement stands up and says, "Hey, by the way, we don't want this," we ignore them. So the hypocrisy around this issue is real.
KEILAR: Texas state rep Joe Moody, we will certainly be watching this story in Texas, and we appreciate you joining us.
