Category: Pennsylvania

The biggest issue for most Pennsylvanians looking to call for their mayors to leave Bloomberg’s coalition will be convincing them that Mayor Mikey is a political liability. If the mayor is a true believer, you might as well stop and either concentrate on booting them out via the ballot box or find another election to get involved with in advance of next year’s battles.

However, one thing you’ll rarely find in politics is a true believer. That doesn’t mean hope is lost. There are arguments to be made that Bloomberg brings baggage.

1. Make the mayor aware that Bloomberg signed his/her name to an ad that was run in both the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Philadelphia Inquirer opposing a bipartisan federal concealed carry amendment that carried 58 votes in the Senate. Ask if the mayor approved the ad and gave permission for their name to be attached. Also ask the mayor if he/she gave approval for the USA Today ad that says law-abiding concealed carry permit holders “threaten the safety of our police officers.”  The ad also says that allowing such permit holders the cross state borders will “undoubtedly result in the deaths of more innocent Americans.”
2. If challenged, politely point out that his/her name is specifically included on ads.  Perhaps offer to fax a copy of the ads or email a copy to the mayor.  Highlight or circle the name for good measure.
3. In fact, you might want to ask if any local tax dollars contributed toward paying for the ads. You might also ask if any tax dollars or city services are contributed toward the other programs Bloomberg is running within the coalition.  Ask if local money has funded any trips to meet with him or federal officials in regards to Second Amendment issues. With more than half a million of us, it’s a reasonable question to which other gun owners in the town would love to know the answer.
4. Also inquire about the letters sent to Congress on concealed carry and other federal issues.  If they mayor doesn’t know what you’re talking about, point out that all of the coalition mayors signed a letter to Speaker Pelosi condemning concealed carry across the country.  Ask why he/she personally believes that the existence of your concealed carry permit makes you a gun trafficker, as the letter implies. Find out if your mayor endorses the position of revoking Constitutional rights without due process via the terror watch list. Take your favorite quotes and ask if he/she endorses them.  Ask about current activities the mayor is involved in at the federal level, and if he/she plans to keep the town’s residents informed of these activities. If they don’t support these actions, suggest that rather than having the Mayor of NYC attribute these statements, they might consider leaving the organization.
5. Politely let the mayor know that a decision to leave is not one that will hurt him/her.  First, gun control supporters don’t vote on that issue, but gun owners do.  Second, they will join a list of mayors, include recent dropouts from Ohio and Texas (Houston, no less!).  Previous Pennsylvania mayors have also dropped out, arguing that the coalition was not as presented, “I have learned that the coalition may be working on issues which conflict with legal gun ownership, and that some actions on your behalf are dubious.” Even New Jersey mayors have removed themselves after find out what Bloomberg was doing in their name, “Regrettably, it has become abundantly clear to me that you are using this coalition of mayors to advance a hidden agenda of bringing lawsuits against members of the firearms industry and spreading anti-gun propaganda.”

If the mayor doesn’t make any promises, have family members or shooting buddies call in the next few days.  Spread the word around the local range.  Start with phone calls and/or emails asking pointed (and polite!) questions about their involvement.  Do it as a concerned citizen and a citizen journalist.

The next step before the ballot box might be letters to the editor, particularly if you have a town newspaper.  The smaller, the better in many cases.  The small papers eat stuff like this up!  A letter to the editor may inspire questions from the paper.  A little local controversy is always good for readership.  (One angle would be to press the tax dollar/time contributed line of questions first. In this economy, there’s no room for wasting time or money on these issues at the local level of government.)

Remember, the goal is to reduce Bloomberg’s sphere of influence.  If the mayor is willing to leave the group, say thank you!  Ask for verification, or if they might be willing to share the notification letter with you so you can pass it along to other gun owners.  Be willing to accept that some people really didn’t understand what they were signing on to with this group.  While it can legitimately be argued they should have done their homework, there’s more peer pressure in Pennsylvania than anywhere else in the country.  Let’s make sure they remember that constituents are more important than government peers.

If you choose to take this on, please let me know. I’d love to keep tabs on the mayors who are being questioned by their constituents.  In addition, whatever the result, I invite you to guest post your experience here.  Share with the pro-gun world what worked and what did not work.  Let us celebrate in your success or start helping you build a network of support if the mayor refuses.

Why should we bother trying to reduce the number of mayors in Bloomberg’s group by way of the soapbox or ballot box? Is it just a distraction from other races and issues at the moment?

I would argue it’s important and not a distraction because it’s an off year activity with reduced participation so our potential impact may wield more influence in the direct results. It also has long-term political implications for the Commonwealth.

This coalition is one of Bloomberg’s favorite PR tools, so it would be nice to disable it. He claims that it’s not just a big city issue, that he has pulled more than 450 mayors from across the country to stand with him in his attacks on gun rights. If he has at least 450 mayors, that means 23% of them are from Pennsylvania!

Bloomberg has invested heavily in this state, and we should be concerned by that fact. What is he hoping to get from that investment? More importantly, what has he already received and what is on the immediate horizon?

Consider the attack on preemption we’re seeing across Pennsylvania. When cities and towns are passing legislation requiring you to report lost or stolen guns in a manner they arbitrarily consider reasonable, it makes gun owners potential victims to abusive prosecutors. Those nine cities are: Erie, Allentown, Reading, Pottsville, Pittsburgh, Lancaster, Philadelphia, Harrisburg, and Wilkinsburg. Guess how many of those cities have mayors in the coalition? Nine.

Not to mention, some of these mayors have their eye on higher offices (hopefully not Mayor Rape). Consider Mayor John Callahan of Bethlehem (population 71,329) who is challenging Congressman Charlie Dent for his seat. Should he be successful (reports indicate he will be a very strong challenger), that seat will go from an A rating to Bloomberg-controlled anti-gun overnight.

While we can’t stop Mayor Callahan until next November, we could see that other mayors find the New York-based coalition to be a political liability for future office and convince them to denounce his positions. If they continue to stand by Bloomberg, we can show up at the ballot box and try to put a stop to their political futures by ousting them from the office.

What I hope is that the citizens of Birdsboro convince Mayor Robert Myers to leave Bloomberg’s anti-gun agenda behind (or send him packing if he refuses) so that the 5,064 residents don’t have to fear a patchwork of local laws.

I don’t want the gun owners among the 2,812 residents of Wind Gap to stand confused should Mayor Mitchell Mogilski try to implement Bloomberg’s ideal gun controls in their town.

The shooting community within the 7,589 residents of Downingtown deserves better if Mayor Heather Ann Bruno refuses to step down from Bloomberg’s comments made in her name against concealed carry holders.

One huge benefit to municipal races is that voter turnout is extremely low. Looking at Bucks County (most of the 8th Congressional District), we find that the county-wide 2007 municipal races had turnout of only 29% compared to 76% in November’s presidential race or even 57% in the last off-year Congressional election. In Montgomery County (most of the 13th Congressional District), voter turnout for municipal races in 2007 was at 30% as compared to the November general at 73% and 2006 Congressional (off-year) race at 55%.

Often, only the most active partisans may turn out for local elections if they are not held alongside major national races. This makes the prospect of giving the boot to local mayors even easier – and sometimes the threat of a challenge is even more useful than an actual get out the vote effort.

If you live in one of the towns governed by a Bloomberg mayor or know a gun owner who does, it may not be hard to turn an election. Get the rest of your family to vote, and tell your friends about the other candidates who may be more friendly to your Second Amendment rights. You may single-handedly turn it into a landslide. Imagine the impact putting a flier in the local gun shop where all the local sportsmen hang out. In an election when many of them aren’t likely turning out to the polls, they might suddenly become a local voting bloc worthy of some campaign time.

Of course, the other benefit to local government is that it may not even require defeating the mayor in an election. The candidates and parties know turnout is consistently a problem. Angering residents for no reason is something they cannot afford to do. One or two phone calls from upset residents may be enough to convince them to leave. A handful of phone calls in the mayor’s office will really shake things up in mid-sized town. If the town has a gun club, even better. Have members call regardless of where they live. They can still claim to be involved with the town, and more importantly, they would be happy to spread word about such anti-gun views come campaign time. There’s a good chance that local mayors have no idea what Mayor Bloomberg has signed them onto, and reason will likely prevail.

Consider the situation with former Williamsport, PA mayor Mary Wolf who very publicly left the group in 2007. This New York Sun article talks to a local gun dealer who found out about her membership and made an issue out of it. Imagine a few signs up at the gun range, getting staff or club officers to let all the residents who come in know about a mayor’s involvement. Use some choice quotes from the ads and letters Bloomberg signed their names to during the Thune debate.

Finally, one of the biggest benefits to local races is the fact that you are closer to most of the other voters. If you know what’s pissing your neighbors off, encourage them to get out to the polls on that issue. Don’t restrict yourself to talking about gun rights. Change begins at home, and you know better than some worker down in Fairfax what’s really got the non-gun owners on your block upset. Remember, just like you probably don’t vote in municipal elections, they probably don’t, either. That means your whole neighborhood just put itself on the map for better treatment and more attention from local officials. (Remember, they can tell who voted. To the winners go the spoils, so get yourself some spoils by simply showing up.)

With only 1,921 people in all of Industry, would it really take much pressure to convince Mayor Nicholas Yanosich that he should stand up for the Constitution instead of against it?

Isn’t it possible to get word out to Mayor Jay Stover in Telford that he shouldn’t be working against the rights of his 4,680 citizens?

Keep in mind, these numbers are a matter of population, registered voters are far fewer.

I mentioned that some of Pennsylvania’s Bloomberg mayors were found in unexpected places. Check out this list of all 103 mayors listed on the site as of August 15. That’s 103 mayors too many, but there are some surprises.

View Bloomberg’s Anti-Gun Mayors in Pennsylvania in a larger map

Do you think the 684 residents of Ulysses know that Mayor Jane Haskins was campaigning against concealed carry and has supported lawsuits that put gun shops out of business? That’s the outlier town in the middle near the NY border.

Or how about the 290 residents of Laporte with Mayor Robert Carpenter and 153 residents of Eagles Mere with Mayor Betty Hays to the southeast of Ulysses?

Are the gun owners among the 626 residents of Marianna aware that Mayor Russell LaRew signed on to support such initiatives? That’s the town in the far southwest corner.

It might surprise people to see that most of the mayors who support Michael Bloomberg are not in the Philadelphia suburbs. In fact, 32% of the mayors are in far western Congressional districts. Of all of the Congressional districts with more than half a dozen mayors, half of them are in or border Allegheny County. It seems like Mayor Bloomberg has been on a serious recruiting spree out near Pittsburgh.

Mayor Mike’s coalition here in Pennsylvania represents less than 3 million residents of more than 12 million in the state. In fact, the average population of the town with Bloomberg mayors is 28,643. If you remove the cities with more than 100,000 residents (the top 4), that average drops to only 9,856. In fact, 18 mayors represent towns and boroughs with less than 1,000 people. More than 50 represent towns of less than 5,000. A full 70% of the mayors in Bloomberg’s army represent towns of less than 10,000 people. That’s hardly a big city mayor coalition.

We in Pennsylvania have municipal races coming up this November, and that got Sebastian and I thinking about gun rights at the local level.  With Michael Bloomberg making more noise out of New York about gun control, it made sense to take a close look at his pawns on the ground.

As one of the largest gun blogs and generally having the ear of Glenn on the issues, Uncle was able to successfully make membership in Bloomberg’s group a liability for Knoxville’s Bill Haslam.  Unfortunately, targeting most of these mayors won’t be so easy.  Some of them legitimately share Bloomberg’s view on gun rights and would like to see them curtailed.  Others don’t really know what they signed up for – accounts by some former Bloomberg mayors suggest that it is sold as a group that really does focus on crime issues rather than taking positions against concealed carry and leading lawsuits for third party actions against gun store owners.  These mayors simply need to be educated.

According to Bloomberg’s website, there are 103 mayors in Pennsylvania in the group.  When the federal concealed carry amendment was up for debate and the Pennsylvania coalition of mayors sent a letter to Senators Casey and Specter, we pulled up the local mayors over at PAGunRights.com.  It’s been one of the most popular pages since we brought the site back online last month.  I’m sure more than a few folks had no idea their mayor was spending part of his/her July campaigning against concealed carry rights.

In my next post on the topic, I’ll have a whole bevy of statistics and potentially vulnerable mayors around the state.  (By vulnerable, I mean either a chance at unseating them or simply convincing them to get out of Bloomberg’s group by a few constituent phone calls.)  In Pennsylvania, we found mayors in some unexpected places.

Speaking of unexpected places, do you know with 100% certainty whether your own mayor has ever been involved in the group?  (No peeking at the website!)

[poll id=”16″]

UPDATE: Welcome Instapundit Readers.   See Part II, Part III, Part IV, and Part V here.