Never underestimate the power of California legislators to embrace the most outrageous ideas when it comes down to gun rights. Other states are resisting “woke” banking discrimination. California is not one of them. It is being considered. The new California bill SB 637 is a good example.
California SB 637 Requires Financial Discrimination Against Firearm Industry
State Senator Dave Min introduced SB 637. This bill requires that public finances in California cease business with any lenders or banks that have business relationships to firearm manufacturers. The bill would impact all aspects of California’s finances including capital projects and state debt.
It would be easy for California to claim that this is California following the opposite track from Texas’s Firearm Industry Nondiscrimination Act (FIND). This law says that if corporate banks have discriminatory policies, they cannot compete for state and municipal contracts.
These corporate banks can make discriminatory decisions if they wish, but they forfeit the right to profit from Texas taxpayer-funded contract profits. U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman, (Republican from Michigan) and U.S. Senator Steve Daines, (Republican from Montana) have introduced similar legislation in Congress. Similar legislation has been introduced in Congress by U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman (R-Mich.) and U.S. Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.).
Senator Kevin Cramer (R.N.D.), introduced the Fair Access to Banking Act. This would require banks to offer credit, capital, and services based on objective risk assessment of individual customers, rather than subjective broad-based decisions that affect whole classes or categories of customers.
Many states, including West Virginia, Montana, Kentucky, Iowa, and Montana, are currently considering FIND Acts. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced recently that he is seeking similar legislation in his state.
California’s legislation differs from these laws in that it requires corporations to discriminate solely because firearm manufacturers are in business of making guns.
This is nothing to be ashamed of, considering California’s economy will soon surpass Germany’s at $3.4 trillion. According to the World Economic Forum it is expected to surpass Germany’s.
According to the OC Breeze (California Treasurer’s Office), the state manages $3.1 trillion in banking transactions per fiscal year. This includes selling bonds, overseeing state debt and investment portfolios, and also includes oversight. California currently has $63.3 billion worth of General Obligation bonds.
Codifying Operation Choke Point
Sen. Min’s proposed legislation would be a state-level Operation Choke Point. This is the illegal coercion by Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and Department of Justice (DOJ), to discriminate against firearm manufacturers.
A U.S. House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Investigation found that FDIC included federally licensed firearms retailers and companies in the ammunition and firearms industries – some of most tightly regulated businesses in America – on a list of potentially dangerous businesses without any evidence or justification.
This would be codified by Sen. Min’s bill. He is no stranger to antigun legislation. He wrote the law that banned the sale of ammunition and firearms on state property. This law ended gun shows at state fairgrounds.
A difficult legal battle
However, the bill could be facing legal headwinds. It could run headlong into Commerce Clause. This is the section of the U.S. Constitution which gives Congress the sole power over interstate commerce regulation.
Sen. Min’s bill would prohibit any corporate entity from doing business with any other than if it adopted the California mandate that such businesses refuse business to law-abiding, creditworthy firearm manufacturers.
Given the size of California’s economy, this is a direct threat to firearm manufacturers, which comprise a Constitutionally-protected industry. The government can force the industry to cease existence by threatening economic might. This is illegally restricting interstate commerce for the firearm industry and banks that provide financial services. It is the responsibility of Congress to regulate, not California.
This bill would also be in violation of the Second Amendment. This bill’s goal is to eliminate the firearm industry. It will also allow law-abiding Americans to exercise the right to purchase firearms for lawful purposes, such as self-defense.
It would shut down the industry that supplies the tools law enforcement needs to protect America’s citizens. The tools that the U.S. military uses in defense of the homeland are just a few examples.
California Discrimination
California is not the first state to use its economic power to discriminate against the firearms industry. CalPERS, the California Public Employees Retirement System, is one the largest public employee pension funds.
Several industries, including those involved in tobacco and fossil fuels have been included on the CalPERS Blacklist. Gun control activists, who have had little success passing rational legislation, are also targeting pension funds across the country to demand divestment.
Fund managers have a legal and fiduciary responsibility to their investors, those who invest in public retirement funds. Fund managers don’t pick the most profitable portfolios. Instead, they invest money from other people to support special interests. This is why gun control advocates for denying investment in firearm-related businesses.
Tucker Carlson, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight reported in 2020 Yu Meng, the Chief Investment Officer at CalPERS was “long engaged in shareholder activism in order to advance leftwing causes such as gun control and have been very aggressive in it.”
CalPERS also invested Californians’ retirement funds in companies that supply the Chinese military.
Meng resigned as CALPers’ president in 2020. A former board member sued the public fund. CalPERS was accused of holding a closed-door meeting regarding Meng’s exit. It has also refused to release records or assets about the fund.
Antigun Future
Sen. Min seems unaffected by any of this. Sen. Min sees his anti-gun radicalism as a way to rise to higher office. U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D.Calif.), announced that she will not seek re-election in 2024.
Before her official announcement, the scramble began with U.S. Rep. Katie Porter of California (D-Calif.), putting her hat in the arena. State Sen. Min sees it as an opportunity to move his antigun agenda from California into Washington, D.C. Rep. Porter supported Sen. Kim to replace him at the U.S. House of Representatives.
Sen. Min’s legislation and his political ambitions are a clear threat for American rights. Particularly when special interests use government’s levers to choose which rights they favor and which ones they don’t.
Story originally posted to NSSF.org
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The post California SB 637 Uses Banks Against the Firearm Industry appeared originally on Personal Defense World.
