CNN host Jim Acosta wasn’t buying the BS being peddled by a National Rifle Association (NRA) board member who tried to offer the worthless notion of thoughts and prayers for children who have been killed in mass shootings such as the one that took place Tuesday at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
Judge Phillip Journey of the 18th Judicial District Court in Kansas serves on the board of the NRA, which held its convention in Houston despite the horror that took place last Tuesday in the Lone Star State. He told Acosta that his court handles family law, and for children that feel terrified, “we all pray for you — lift you up in prayer, that we want to hope that you get through this without the consequences that we see so often in victims of domestic crime.”
That led Acosta to ask:
“Can they bring an AR-15 in your courtroom?”
Judge Journey admitted that guns aren’t allowed in his courtroom, adding that they aren’t allowed in schools, either, which led Acosta to retort:
“Well, people don’t seem to have much trouble if they want to unleash that kind of destruction to do just that. NRA supporters like yourself keep saying that the answer to all of this is good guys with guns. The 19 good guys with guns failed in Uvalde. The cops were there in the school. There was a resource officer that was apparently MIA and none of that helped.”
Journey suggested law enforcement might be to blame in Uvalde, to which Acosta noted:
“With these mass shootings, it keeps coming back to the AR-15 and similar models. Why do people need an AR-15 anyway?”
Journey was silent for a few seconds that seemed to last an eternity, finally responding:
“You know, it’s just a semiautomatic rifle. If you want to be prejudiced about the way it looks. I was aware of what happened in the ’94 semiautomatic firearms ban and there were rifles of similar function that just didn’t look as ugly. They weren’t black guns like a Ruger mini 14 and the Ruger mini 14 was appropriate and the other was not.”
Acosta countered:
“I do want to ask you about the assault weapons ban. How is it an 18-year-old can buy an AR-15 style rifle and have 16 rounds of ammo like we saw with him in Uvalde?”
The judge replied:
“Well, he did not have any prior convictions. He didn’t have any prior issues that would have kept him from purchasing one. It’s my understanding from the news that he purchased it through a firearms dealer, and passed the background check. He didn’t have any prior convictions.”
The host then asked:
“Right, but should an 18-year-old have an AR-15? What’s he going to do with it?”
The judge attempted to use a favorite line for those who think there should be no restrictions whatsoever on the right to own whatever gun a person wants:
“Should an 18-year-old have one in the Army?”
But Acosta was more than ready for that assertion, telling Journey:
“They have military training in the army. The 18-year-old in Uvalde did not. He turned 18 and he went out and bought an AR-15.”
Journey wandered off and began talking about mental health being the real issue, only to have Acosta note that there are mentally ill people all over the world, but only the United States has so many mass shootings, to which the judge weakly countered:
“There have been several other mass shootings all over the world.”
But Acosta shut the judge down cold:
“Not to the level that we have in the United States, come on.”
The NRA and the gun lobby have no answers, only excuses. Sensible gun reform is desperately needed in this country. How many more children have to die in hail of gunfire before something is done?