I tend to believe that most people are decent enough. Many who advocate for gun control, for example, really are well-meaning, even if they're horribly misguided.
But the groups that direct people's efforts, though? That tends to be a little different. Those folks know good and well what's going on, and still push their agenda.
For example, Everytown knows that its so-called research is biased, but it still puts it out there like it's really just a neutral organization.
Perhaps the worst of the bunch is Giffords.
See, while it pushes an anti-gun agenda, one of its big things each year is its grading system. Giffords awards states a letter grade based on the gun control laws they push down residents' throats.
And it seems that despite its protestations, it really is all about gun control.
So Giffords gave Vermont an F in 2018, but a B- in 2024. Only, well...
Vermont's homicide rate has been rising in recent years. In 2018, it was 2.2 per 100,000. In 2024, it was 3.2 per 100,000. It is one of very few states to see it's homicide rate RISE in the last couple of years of the national rate falling.
— Kostas Moros (@MorosKostas) February 20, 2026
Once again, this just demonstrates… https://t.co/RE8PsI7aGt pic.twitter.com/aCdHOQ32v1
Vermont's homicide rate has been rising in recent years. In 2018, it was 2.2 per 100,000. In 2024, it was 3.2 per 100,000. It is one of very few states to see it's homicide rate RISE in the last couple of years of the national rate falling.
Once again, this just demonstrates how Giffords thinks authoritarian gun control is an end in itself, they don't actually care about safety.
Expanded gun control demonstrably has not caused any reduction in Vermont's homicide rate, and it instead has risen.
Now, if this were really about safety, Giffords wouldn't be patting Vermont on the back for just passing a handful of anti-gun bills. It'd likely be concerned about how the homicide rate has risen there, even as it dropped across the board almost everywhere else in 2024.
But the thing is, it's not about safety. It's never really been about safety for these groups.
It's about curtailing lawful gun ownership. That's all it's ever been. That's why they get alarmed when more law-abiding Americans buy guns. They pretend it's about public safety, as if lawful citizens are going around shooting up the place all the time, but the reality is that most shootings involve a firearm that was obtained illegally. From the mass killer who takes his daddy's gun to the criminal on the street carrying out a drive-by with a gun he bought for a few bucks off of some crackhead, most bad guys don't go to gun stores.
They can't. Not lawfully, anyway.
Vermont is an interesting case, though, because while the homicide rate is still relatively low for the United States, it's up one full point from when Giffords gave it its lowest grade, and that didn't stop Giffords from giving The Green Mountain State a B- in 2024.
It's a prime example of how the truth on the ground doesn't matter to these groups, just so long as they get what they want out of the state in question.
