Glocks are among the most popular handguns in the country. They're priced decently, run reliably, and just plain work. Police trust them as do numerous armed citizens. They're everywhere.
And that bothers a lot of people. Now, though, Glock is being sued by the city of Baltimore and the State of Maryland, with the help of Everytown for Gun Safety, and let's talk a bit about what's really going on here.
First, let's get into the official word.
In an attempt to keep fully automatic guns off the streets, Baltimore and Maryland authorities Wednesday sued Glock, the maker of some of the best-selling handguns in America. The lawsuit demands Glock take steps to prevent its guns from being modified into machine-gun-like weapons capable of firing 120 rounds in one minute.
Small, easily installed devices known as “auto sears” or “switches” that are growing more common have terrified law enforcement because they enable high-powered violence not seen since 1934, when Congress banned machine guns after their prominent use by mobsters.
But police statistics show the number of “modified Glock” shootings is on the rise, including an incident near a Baltimore YMCA in March in which a woman’s car was hit 18 times, and police found 41 shell casings nearby. In Philadelphia last year, eight high school students were shot in one spray, including a 16-year-old who was hit nine times. In Memphis in April, a police officer was killed and two other officers wounded in a firefight with two teenagers, one armed with a modified gun.
The lawsuit, filed in Baltimore City Circuit Court, is the first to test Maryland’s new Gun Industry Accountability Act, passed by the General Assembly last year to create liability for gun manufacturers and possibly circumvent an earlier related law. The Maryland lawsuit mirrors others filed in Chicago, Minnesota and New Jersey in recent months.
But here's the problem: Glock doesn't make the switches. They didn't design them. They didn't have anything to do with them.
Further, they're illegal to make or possess--at least if you're not one of the handful that has a transferable switch that was made before 1986 and is registered with the ATF. People are getting them left and right, but they're not doing it lawfully.
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What at least some are claiming is that Glock hasn't redesigned its reliable handgun so it can't accept a switch.
Yet they don't punish Toyota because someone might modify one of their cars and circumvent emissions controls or something. Why would they?
But this isn't really about full-auto switches or even Glock.
No, this is about making it as expensive as possible to be in the firearm industry and to offer products to the civilian market. Right now, this is the angle of attack they're taking, but it will not end there.
The federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act was created specifically to stop these kinds of nuisance lawsuits aimed at the gun industry, particularly when they're being attacked for the actions of a third party. That's what's happening here. They're trying to pretend it's Glock's fault and to get them to stop selling their guns in Maryland, but does anyone really think that would do any good?
It's not like the people putting switches on their guns are going to suddenly decide they don't want Glocks because they're not sold there.
They'll just get them from somewhere else.
But if enough states do it and enough companies get sued, they'll either go out of business or just stop selling to private citizens.
You don't need to control guns if there are no guns for anyone to buy, after all. That's what this is really about. That's the long game at work with anti-gunners, and they're using anti-gun states to try and do it.
Make no mistake. Glock has done nothing wrong.
These two governments just don't like the right to keep and bear arms.
