With the debate surrounding gun control heating up and President Obama calling for action on a national level, Humboldt County Sheriff Mike Downey said today that he stands with a group of sheriffs resisting federal control.
Downey is among the law enforcement officers on a “growing list of sheriffs saying ‘no’ to Obama gun control,” according to the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association.
“For me it’s a constitutional issue,” said Downey, confirming his alliance with CSPOA.
According to the Texas-based group founded by former Arizona sheriff Richard Mack, “Sheriffs have risen up all over our great nation to stand up against the unconstitutional gun control measures being taken.”
Also included on the list of 90 county sheriffs from around the U.S. are Mendocino County Sheriff Thomas Allman, Del Norte County Sheriff Dean Wilson and Siskiyou County Sheriff Jon Lopey.
Former sheriff Mack is a member of Oath Keepers with a history of resistance to federal gun control. While serving as sheriff in Arizona, he initiated Mack and Printz v. United States (co-plaintiff Jay Printz was a Montana sheriff). The lawsuit challenged a portion of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act that established a national instant background check system. The suit ultimately made it to the Supreme Court where the justices ruled 5-4 that certain provisions of the Brady Act were unconstitutional.
This article appears in Eureka’s New Boss.
Downey is a Republican. Why should we be surprised by his position?
What other laws will our sheriff disobey because he feels like it? This is genuinely scary.
What laws?
Ew, what is this creepy guy doing here?
As long as there is a government that seeks to repress the people then the people shall have the right to bare arms. Just because there are crazy people out there, sensationalized by the media, doesn’t mean the government has the right to alienate our constitutional rights. I’m glad the sheriff understands and is willing to uphold the constitution, at least in this instance.
Fucking pigs…
I don’t understand how this can be more or less constitutional than our current laws. We control guns. This is a fact. You can’t have a bazooka. You can’t have fully auto. You can have semi auto as long as the clip is 10 rounds or less and a new clip can’t be loaded quickly. It’s this clip loading part that needs strengthening. The gun companies work around it. We already regulate guns to hold down the injury rate (i.e. massacres). What in heck is this “unconstitutional” whining. Explain it to me please.
Do you know why citizens in the US have guns?
All white males were required to serve in armed militias before the civil war to make sure that slave rebellions could be put down.
When folks talk about guns as a way to keep the government in line and militias they are misguided and misinformed. It was to keep the slaves in line.
It isn’t unconstitutional unless our court system says so. It sounds like a person we entrust to uphold the law is picking and choosing which laws he feels should be enforced. If so, he should be recalled.
It’s distressing because this worldview is usually reserved for fringe right-wing cuckoos. That our sheriff has outed himself this way, it’s very worrying. I don’t feel safe anymore.
You liberals make me want to puke. ~”Sometimes a closed mind should be accompanied by a closed mouth.” ~ A.H.
What sort of fantasy world do those folks live who believe that their ownership of guns — including assault rifles — will somehow protect them against tyranny? Their weapons, even though there are a lot of them, are pathetic compared to what a tyrannical government would mobilize against them: tanks, mortars, artillery, airstrikes, drones, millions of military/police. Just think of Waco and Ruby Ridge, and that was a government showing great restraint.
oh no, we are now joining the ranks of ignorant fear mongering sheriffs (linn county oregon possibly the most famous). so sad.
there is nothing unconstitutional with the actions taken by obama (executive orders, all 23 of them) nor the weapons ban submitted to the house today. so sad these nimrods do not understand the second amendment (he thinks the 2nd amendment gives him the right to have a grenade launcher? really?). the rhetoric is so thick, it reminds me of the fog from early this morning; the difference being that the fog is real. (reminds me of the rhetoric and ignorance based reasoning of the tea party, luckily they are on their way out as an influence on society; so excited to have information based reasoning back in the foreground).
I never realized that all these sheriffs were Supreme Court Justices too and that they get to decide what laws are constitutional. They should be fired if they don’t understand how America’s legal system works.
I never realized that all these sheriffs were Supreme Court Justices too and that they get to decide what laws are constitutional. They should be fired if they don’t understand how America’s legal system works.
Yeah Matt, did you hear? The sheriff is a constitutional scholar. All this time, we had a genius in our midst.
We don’t need no stickin’ checks and balances. The Sheriff decides what laws we follow and what laws can be disregarded. That’s how we did it in the good old days before desegregation.
You libtard idiots make me sick! As well as you extreme rightists. First of all according to the Constitution, Federal agencies must have COMPLETE allowance and permission from ANY state, local, county, etc. officers and officials before they have any kind of jurisdiction there, hence if the feds try to move in and take away from citizens without permission guess what…that’s the same as stealing and the local officers do indeed have the means to detain them.
Suuuure Eyeswideopen, and federal income taxes are unconstitutional too. What other delusional beliefs do you harbor? I expect as much from Internet denizens, but from our sheriff? OMG! How did his membership in this organization get overlooked before the election?
Eyeswideopen, you’re either high as a fucking kite or dangerously ignorant. Don’t go to law school, just Google “supremacy clause.”
As for our sheriff/constitutional scholar, let’s examine the First Amendment, shall we? It guarantees freedom of speech, yet speech is regulated, only to a certain extent, in order to provide society with some basic protections.
Examples – no inciting people to immediate violent rampages. No lying in court under oath. No advertisements claiming that cigarettes will increase your IQ to 180 and make you fart rainbows.
I agree that people’s right to bear arms cannot and should not be eliminated. Setting aside that whole “well-regulated militia” qualifier that most people find it convenient to gloss over, there is nothing wrong with regulating our Second Amendment rights to a certain extent.
You need a license to operate a car – why not a firearm? Is it really to much to ask for people to take a one- or two-day class before they wield the power to kill?
You need to pass a background check to be a fucking notary public, for Christ’s sake. It’s not OK for someone with a criminal record to verify identity, but it’s too much to ask that the gun show loophole be closed to make it harder for those same folks to get guns?
The Second Amendment doesn’t say that we have the right to own only “guns”, but instead “arms.” Should we all be allowed to purchase other arms? Maybe a grenade launcher or surface-to-air missile? With the power of our military, God knows that we would need an arsenal like that if we actually were put in the position of resisting government tyranny.
I realize Downeys a repub, but that quote, “For me it’s a constitutional issue,” is really all he said? U sure he wasn’t trying to play on the fence and say he’s taking a uniform stance against anything that breaks the 2nd amendment?
I know the NCJ is hard-pressed for good equipment that might record statements like this in full context, but to me this reeks of selective quoting on the part of NCJ. Too bad.
If Downey said anything worth repeating, why don’t you Google it yourself and blow us all away?
I’ll save you the trouble. Cuz there’s nothing there that would stand up to intelligent debate, that’s why.
It’s odd that you can take a generalized six-word quote and spout off an entire blog post about it. If you’re gonna say the dude hates Obama and is gonna rise up with the South, at least give us more of what he said. Especially if it sounds like a caveman talking.
It’s not my job to provide the quotes. And apparently it’s not ncj’s job either.
And this guy wasn’t even at the presser! Was that he only bit of burns’ scribbles he could read? No call to the Sheriff for some clarification. God knows there was no transcript of the interview. Who ows, maybe Downey is eveything this story and all the trolls say he is. This is just a real shitty reporting job.
I’d appreciate the sheriff clarifying whether he intends to uphold the law, or go rogue. If Humboldt is returning to the ‘good old days’ of vigilante justice, I’m afraid.
ILTK, even if he does clarify that we can’t depend on NCJ giving us that clarification … They may just take six words, maybe from the middle of a sentence, and words not necessarily in the same order as when he said them, then throw it into a blog post and slap a racy headline on it.
NCJ doesn’t normally do this shit either. That’s what’s so disappointing. Do better, guys.
I can’t wait for Sheriff Downey to announce his opinions on abortion and global warming.
I’m glad that the sherrif has the balls to stand up to Obama and his bs its not the gun that killed those kids its the twisted fuck that stole the gun and pulled the trigger. All they want to do is take the guns from the honest people.do you really think someone that’s going to kill someone goes to the gun store goes through a background check waits 10 days in (California) then proceeds to be a criminal and kill
sheriff has busted many of Burns mega pot growing friends. this is payback.
my bad, i thought this was real news written by a reporter not just another hack piece from the entertainment compiler.
Is there a recall procedure applicable to sheriffs?
in Switzerland all take the army guns home, machine guns grenade launchers, they say its why no one attacks Switzerland, once in a while a nut case goes off, but mental health there is better than here, better nutcase checks there keep guns out of such hands
nut case control is what is needed, not guns
I will have a very difficult time ever voting for Sheriff Downey again. I hope someone with different views runs.You’d think a cop would be in favor of gun control, having seen the mayhem caused by out of control automatic weapons proliferation.
Downey had let the huge growers, visible on Google Earth, destroy the environment while he busts moms and pops. Not a good record.
Feel free and write me in on your next ballot for sheriff. I run on the platform of not allowing ANYBODY to shoot kids in the back, crazies with flare guns, or beat homeless people to death. And, I refuse to vote for any of the assholes in the system. It hasn’t changed from within, it’s not going too. That’s Pete Westfall for Humboldt County Sheriff, and I appreciate your write-in vote.
Lets elect former Blue Lake police Chief Gundersen…who’s love of guns goes beyond the laws of man.
His era has finally arrived!