Political fearmonger Greg Pruett has been trying to scare voters away from the Open Primaries Initiative (OPI) with the preposterous claim that it will bring gun control to Idaho. Pruett makes a living by frightening voters with fake threats to gun rights for the purpose of electing extremists to public office. It is also his personal meal ticket.
Pruett, who operates a variety of propaganda outlets (all of which have “donate” buttons), admits that the OPI is not a direct threat to gun rights. He claims it’s an indirect threat because it will “make Idaho more like California.” What Pruett is really concerned about is the fact that the OPI will break the stranglehold that his extremist allies have over who gets elected to public office. He is an integral part of an unsavory alliance–the extremist branch of the Republican Party, currently ruled by Dorothy Moon, and the Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF), which is funded with out-of-state dark money–that has turned Idaho into a culture war battlefield.
The alliance supports extremist candidates and uses scorched-earth campaigns to defeat traditional, reasonable Republicans in the low-turnout closed GOP primary. Pruett’s job is to frighten voters into supporting extremist candidates by making false gun control claims against their opponents.
Gun owners should take Pruett’s outlandish claims with a large grain of salt. The Idaho Constitution contains a strong prohibition against gun controls. Article 1, Section 11, proclaims: “The people have the right to keep and bear arms, which right shall not be abridged.” That cannot be changed without a constitutional amendment, which would require a two-thirds vote of each House and then a majority of Idaho voters. That will never happen. Numerous gun protections are contained in our statute books, including a 2014 law that prohibited a wide range of gun restrictions. The vote was unanimous.
With every possible gun protection on the law books, it would be impossible to chip away at the gun rights of Idahoans. But that has not stopped Pruett from claiming the gun sky is falling and that he must have lots of money to stop it. He has been reduced to pushing for gun laws that most Idahoans don’t want–guns in schools, the right of gun-toting private militias to march around town and preventing local governments from keeping guns out of certain sensitive venues. Now, he is making the easily-debunked claim that the OPI will cause gun control.
The fact is that Pruett has no use for initiatives. He has called for “abolishing the ballot initiatives in Idaho.” He opposed the 2018 Medicaid expansion initiative and the 2022 initiative to increase education spending. Pruett and his allies desperately want to kill the right of the people to enact their own laws. The closed GOP primary has produced non-responsive Legislatures that dwell on culture war distractions, while ignoring issues important to the people–schools, roads, property tax reform, water and the everyday nuts and bolts of running a government. The Pruett bunch thrives on discord.
Pruett contends that Idahoans must be armed to the teeth to fight off the many evils he sees in our state. He warns, among other alarming dangers, that the “forces of Satan have mobilized against the forces of God” and that “God-hating liberal activists now believe they can normalize pedophilia.” His answer is for people to arm themselves to the teeth and “defend liberty or die trying.” If you go to the gregpruett.com website, you can easily find his “donate” button, which will keep you alive in the apocalyptic battle.
Voters will likely see several Pruett front organizations during the fight over the OPI leading up to the November election. His Second Amendment Alliance, which has partnered with Ammon Bundy, has a “donate” button. So do his Keep Idaho Free site, which is concerned about Satan and guns; his extremist Idaho Dispatch publication; and his Freedom Bros podcast with his old IFF pal, Dustin Hurst. Lots of opportunities for the gullible to financially support Pruett’s pocketbook.
But voters can rest easy. There is absolutely no evidence to support the claim that the OPI will cause gun control. Neither will it cause warts or male pattern baldness. It will only cause good government in the Gem State.
There appears to be a disinformation letter writing campaign claiming that IF a voter does not rank all choices their ballot will be thrown out and/or “exhausted”. In some cases the writer refers to a website secureidahoelections. The site/organization appears to be specifically focused on defeating Prop 1 yet I could find no records on the SOS Sunshine website. Curious.
Thanks for your comment, Mary. Dorothy Moon and her zealots are behind the website. They are all on the same page with their misinformation campaign. They don’t think Idahoans are smart enough to mark an X to vote for their favorite candidate in the primary election, or to do the same in the general election, with the option of ranking the remaining candidates in their order of preference. Just because they are not able to figure that out, does not mean that the average Idaho voter will not be able to easily do it. Jim
A great opinion piece by Jim Jones. I wish that people like Simpson, Fulcher, Labrador, Riech, and Crapo would heed his words.
I agree with him overall, but I do feel we should ban assault weapons. It is true they are not automatic weapons, but their ammo delivers so much energy that they are very destructive to humans. They have become the weapon of choice for mass shooters. The data showed that when we had a ban, that the number of mass murders declined. The weapons were developed to kill humans in war. We don’t need them openly among the general public. They have become the leading cause of death among children. Therefore, I would advocate for the banning of assault weapons and bump stocks. We don’t need them. If a ban just saves the life of one child it is worth it, especially if it’s your child or grandchild. I can’t imagine what the parents of murdered children have had to go through. The assault weapons are so powerful and destructive that they can’t even recognize their murdered child.
Then I would also advocate for common sense gun laws, like adequate background checks, restrictions for perpetrators of violent crimes like domestic violence, aggravated assault, etc, not to permanently prevent them from having guns but to have enhanced restrictions until they show evidence that they are no longer a risk of being violent. I also think that anyone being found guilty of charges of drug or alcohol abuse should have similar restrictions. We restrict drivers convicted of a DUI for public safety reasons, shouldn’t we do the same with guns. Couldn’t we argue that cars don’t kill, it’s people who drive cars that can kill? It’s the same with guns, yet we accept safe a sane regulations regarding operating a car, why do we oppose similar regulations regarding guns?
However, I agree with Jones that the open primary initiative has nothing to do with gun ownership.
Thanks for your comment, Steve. Your gun safety remarks are right on the money. I wrote about the need to get AR-15s of the streets several years ago–https://www.idahopress.com/opinion/columnists/jim-jones-war-weapons-dont-belong-on-americas-streets/article_43e6715e-09db-5fef-ba51-8b31f13a9a9d.html Weapons of war have no place on American streets. I think the majority of Americans agree. Jim