From Paul Valone of Grass Roots North Carolina----
Paul Valone, 22-Year Gun Rights Leader,
Endorses Ted Cruz For President
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Why gun rights advocates should support Ted Cruz
Perhaps jaded by twenty-two years as a gun rights leader, I’ve never thought much of presidential politics. We’re usually instructed to endure the “lesser of two evils” by centrists who don’t want you to consider that the lesser of two evils is still evil.
So I didn’t hold high hopes, last year, when a fellow conservative activist told me the Ted Cruz people wanted to meet me. I expected to meet a candidate who would “speechify” for thirty minutes, wave to his adoring fans, and leave.
Instead, Senator Cruz sat down at a table of perhaps two dozen activists and said, “Okay, what should I be doing?” What followed was nearly two hours of give-and-take which convinced me that Ted Cruz had the potential to be the next Ronald Reagan – convinced me so effectively, in fact, that I agreed to be a state campaign co-chair.
What most impressed me was his point that we should never listen to what politicians say, but rather pay attention to what they have done. For example, Donald Trump makes all the right noises about supporting the right to keep and bear arms. His website contains the following verbiage: “The Second Amendment to our Constitution is clear. The right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed upon [sic]. Period.”
That sounds great until you consider what Trump said a few years ago: “…I support the ban on assault weapons and I support a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun.”1
In truth, Donald Trump’s beliefs are most accurately summarized in one of his more recent statements: “I’m very capable of changing to anything I want to change to.” Therein lies the real Donald Trump – a snake oil salesman with enough smarts to know what you want to hear.
When I studied the voting histories of Sen. Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio, at first blush they appear quite similar. But where was Rubio in 2013, after Sandy Hook, when Barack Obama attacked the Second Amendment with a massive gun control scheme parading under the misnomer “universal background checks”?
It was Sen. Cruz, along with Sens. Mike Lee and Rand Paul, who solicited a letter from Senate Republicans vowing to filibuster S.649. It was these three statesmen who forced Democrats to get sixty votes for cloture on S. 649 – and the long list of horrific amendments proposed to the bill, including semi-auto and magazine bans – instead of simple majorities.
But for the efforts of Sen. Cruz, today we would be living under a massive gun registration scheme disguising itself as “universal background checks.” Just today, after the death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Cruz promised to filibuster whichever nightmare Supreme Court nomination Obama sends to the Senate.
Beyond Cruz’s perfect 100% pro-gun voting record, he is, to date, the only presidential candidate to return Grass Roots North Carolina’s presidential survey – scoring a perfect 100% and securing Grass Roots North Carolina’s highest four-star (****) evaluation.
Some US senators, such as Richard Burr and Lindsey Graham, reportedly hate Ted Cruz. But they hate him because he has held their feet to the fire over issues as diverse as Obamacare, the budget, and gun-control. In fact, Cruz practices exactly the same type of confrontational politics to which Grass Roots North Carolina attributes its twenty-two years of success.
Grass Roots North Carolina does not endorse political candidates. But for these reasons, among others, I personally endorse Sen. Ted Cruz for President of the United States. Anyone who supports not only the Second Amendment, but the American ideal of individual liberty should join me in electing a president who has not only memorized the Constitution, but who lives it each day.
Armatissimi e liberissimi,
F. Paul Valone
President, Grass Roots North Carolina
Executive Director, Rights Watch International
