Plummer Says Proposed Legislation Regarding Owning Firearms an "Overreach"

State Senator Jason Plummer (R-Edwardsville) is sharing concern over recently introduced legislation, (House Bill 888) that he says forces law-abiding citizens to give Illinois state agencies access to their personal social media accounts for considering owning a firearm. 

“It’s shocking that big-government liberals think the people of Illinois would be OK with granting government agencies the ability to snoop through their social media platforms,” said Sen. Plummer. “This ‘Orwellian’ mindset is frightening and something that all Americans, regardless of their partisan affiliation, should be on guard against. In America we care about individual rights and privacy.”

Sen. Plummer also highlighted legislation (Senate Bill 107) that calls for a ban on the sale or the unregistered possession of dozens of semi-automatic firearms, dubbed “assault weapons”, to scare and mislead citizens. The bill also causes gun owners to pay additional fees and consent to a government registry for owning these firearms, otherwise risk criminal penalties.

“This means that failure to pay additional fees and acquiesce to register lawful and privately owned firearms in a massive government-controlled database, even firearms passed down in a family from generation to generation, will lead to a felony charge and fines and/or prison time,” said Sen. Plummer. 

Plummer said numerous types of widely-owned semi-automatic rifles, pistols, and shotguns are included based solely on their appearance rather than how they function.

“This legislation is an obvious overreach and infringes upon law-abiding citizens’ privacy and Second Amendment rights,” said Sen. Plummer. “The proposed legislation penalizes good, law-abiding citizens who have done absolutely nothing wrong. I plan to share my concerns with HB 888 and SB 107 with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle. This legislation sounds like stuff that comes out of the mind of totalitarian state apparatchiks—not from elected officials in a republic committed to individual rights and freedoms.”

Plummer spoke with Ray Watt in Springfield about the proposed legislation...