Guns in U.S. are “ultimate check against government tyranny”: Cruz

The right to gun ownership in America is not just about hunting, or protecting property and person, but “the ultimate check against government tyranny,” argues a fund appeal from Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas.

The Cruz fund raising letter echoes arguments made by militia groups, and a far-right demonstration last winter that followed voter passage of an initiative requiring criminal background checks for gun purchasers.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, speaks at a rally in front of the WWII Memorial Sunday, Oct. 13, 2013 in Washington as Senate leaders have taken the helm in the search for a deal to end the partial government shutdown and avert a federal default. The memorial has been closed due to the government shutdown. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas: Guns owned by Americans are “the ultimate check against government tyranny — for the protection of liberty,” argues the White House hopeful. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

“The Second Amendment to the Constitution isn’t just for protecting hunting rights, and it’s not only to safeguard your right to target practice,” said Cruz, a former Texas solicitor general.

“It is a Constitutional right to protect your children, your family, your home, our lives and to serve as the ultimate check against government tyranny — for the protection of liberty.”

The argument was immediately challenged — and lampooned — by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, another possible GOP candidate.

“Well, we tried that once in South Carolina: I wouldn’t go down that road again,” Graham told reporters in Washington, D.C.

Graham was referring to South Carolina as the first state to secede from the Union after Abraham Lincoln was elected President, and site of the first shots fired in the Civil War.

“I think an informed electorate is probably a better check than, you know, guns in the street,” Graham added.

Verbal shots fired by the two Republican White House hopefuls illustrate the direction taken by their party in recent years.

Graham was considered a conservative insurrectionist when he was elected to Congress as part of the GOP sweep in 1994. He is now a Senate insider. Cruz, elected in 2012, is far to his right and is already responsible for one partial shutdown of the federal government.

Graham argued that Republicans have a political target on which to take aim.

“I’m not looking for an insurrection,” he said. “I’m looking to defeat Hillary. We’re not going to out-gun her . . . I think in a democracy the best check on government is voter participation. I think the First Amendment probably protects us more.”

But Cruz is hoping to corral a key constituency among Republican voters and caucus-goers who will choose their party’s 2016 presidential nominee.

“I am the only candidate running for President who not only believes in the Constitutional right to keep and bear arms — but has the record of fighting for it, tooth and nail.”

He has competition. Ex-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Florida sen. Marco Rubio spoke at the just-completed National Rifle Association convention.

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