Mayor Quit Bloomberg's Gun Control Group Because Goal Was 'Confiscation'

POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y.–Poughkeepsie Mayor John Tkazyik says he cut ties with Michael Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) when he realized MAIG’s ultimate goal was “to promote confiscation of guns from law-abiding citizens.”

Spelling out his views in a February 5th op-ed, Tkazyik wrote:

I’m Mayor of one of the largest cities in the Hudson Valley, just 90 minutes north of New York City. I’m a life member of the National Rifle Association and a former member of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, or MAIG, started by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2006.

I’m no longer a member of MAIG. Why? Just as Ronald Reagan said of the Democrat Party, it left me. And I’m not alone: Nearly 50 pro-Second Amendment mayors have left the organization. They left for the same reason I did. MAIG became a vehicle for Bloomberg to promote his personal gun-control agenda–violating the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens and taking resources away from initiatives that could actually work to protect our neighborhoods and save some precious lives. […]

It did not take long to realize that MAIG’s agenda was much more than ridding felons of illegal guns; that under the guise of helping mayors facing a crime and drug epidemic, MAIG intended to promote confiscation of guns from law-abiding citizens.

Tkazyik said he doesn’t believe “encroaching on our right to bear arms” makes anyone safer. Thus, he refuses to be part of MAIG.

Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins.