Ramsey Against Guns-In-Lots Protections for Hunters

Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey said Thursday he believes the advancing guns-in-lots legislation goes “too far” as it’s currently written.

He spoke to reporters at his weekly media availability about Sen. Mike Faulk’s bill, SB3002, which moved out of a Senate committee earlier this week and is headed to the Senate floor. The bill, which would allow employees to store firearms in their cars parked on company lots, was amended so that it applied only to gun carry permit holders and licensed hunters aged 21 or older.

“I do think they go too far, and I’m as big of a Second Amendment rights person that’s ever lived,” Ramsey said. “But I think expanding it to hunting licenses — even though I can see why they did that — but that’s something that doesn’t need to be done. It needs to be gun carry permit holders only.”

Sen. Beverly Marrero, D-Memphis, and others at the committee meeting Tuesday questioned the level of training and expertise necessary for a person to obtain a hunter’s license. While the meeting was going on, an Associated Press reporter purchased a license online for $27.

Ramsey said he’s never had a “philosophical struggle” like the current one, between property rights and Second Amendment rights, both of which are traditional pillars of the Republican party.

“The [National Rifle Association] and I are on different sides on this, right now,” he said. “That’s highly unusual for me, of course, but they want to go much further than I do.”

Still, he said he believes differences among legislators will be worked out and that he expects to see amendments proposed on the Senate floor.