Dan Caplis Show, Ken Buck, September 16, 2019
Station: KHOW, 630 am
Show: Dan Caplis Show
Guests: Buck, Ken
Date: September 16, 2019
Topics: Red Flag Bill, Jon Caldara, House Judiciary Committee, Buck’s Amendment, Gang members, Gun Violence, Messaging Bill, Firearms,Potentially Dangerous Person, Illegal Drug Issue, Prescription Drug Issue, Former Prosecutor, Extreme Risk Protection Order, Civil Liberty, Mass Shootings, Assault Weapon Ban, Rural Colorado, Raccoons, Prairie Dogs, Nancy Pelosi, Suppressors, Silencers, Military Uses, President Trump, Mental Illness, Single Parent Families, Impeachment Hearings, Bill Clinton
GUEST HOST JON CALDARA [00:00:00] […] This is — now, this bad law in Colorado could well be put forward nationwide. The administration and Congress are under a ton of pressure to, quote, “do something.” Nothing scares me more than the call to “do something.” Ken Buck was sitting on one of the committees where there was going to be “something” to do. Ken Buck joins us now. Congressman Ken Buck, thank you for joining us. You are with Jon Caldara, [I am] glad to have you.
UNITED STATES REPRESENATIVE FROM COLORADO’S FOURTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT, AND CHAIRMAN OF THE COLORADO GOP, KEN BUCK [00:00:40] Jon, I have got to tell you, I was told that I’d be on with Dan Caplis. Now, this is a rare treat to be on with Jon Caldara.
CALDARA [00:00:48] Yeah, yeah, well, the thing is, we knew if we told you the truth you would never come on. So, that’s–it’s a trick we use every time.
BUCK [00:00:56] [hearty laughter].
CALDARA [00:00:56] All right, so the Democrats in the House Judiciary Committee marked up this bill to authorize the federal government to issue extreme risk protection orders — Red Flag law — because there’s nothing that the feds do that they can’t do better than the people on the local level. You were a member of this committee. What was the — what was the purpose of this? Before we get to the amendment that you put forward, what passed?
BUCK [00:01:27] Well, what passed was garbage, because it won’t pass the Senate. The president wouldn’t sign it, and it is a messaging bill and only a messaging bill. The idea that somehow the federal government has the resources to even attempt this law–. Federal judges deal with five-, six-, seven-, eight-week trials. They don’t deal with cases involving a firearm and a potentially dangerous person. It isn’t what they do, it’s not what we intend for them to do. There was another bill that–.
CALDARA [00:01:59] And you say this, also, as a former prosecutor yourself. You understand this world.
BUCK [00:02:03] As a federal prosecutor and a state prosecutor, absolutely! I served in both jurisdictions, and I can tell you that the federal government doesn’t have the resources or the expertise to deal with these kinds of issues.
CALDARA [00:02:17] And so, under this — under Colorado’s law, a Colorado judge gets to — one: your guns get taken away without due process. A Colorado judge gets to decide whether or not you get them back. You have to prove your innocence in order to give this back. It’s a real — it’s — it just turns the idea of due process and the presumption of innocence on its head. You weren’t with me, but I have said that I can live with a good Red Flag law. I can support an extreme risk protection order if it was done right. Some states, I believe, have done a right. Colorado did not do it right. What is it that your friends on the committee are trying to do in Washington? Are they trying to do it right?
BUCK [00:03:05] No, they’re trying to do something to divide the American people. Jon, this is such a complicated issue. We use more prescription drugs in this country than any country in the world, more illegal drugs — 80% of the world’s illegal drugs. We deal completely in a different way with mental health than we used to 30, 40 years ago. There are all kinds of things that, if we want to make this country safer, we need to start addressing. A Band-Aid like this is no way to deal with this issue. And it’s — I agree with you on the constitutionality of it. It’s wrong for those reasons, also.
CALDARA [00:03:41] Can you see yourself supporting some type of red flag law, or for you is it just off the table altogether? Or, does it have to be done on a state level? Or is it — or is it. — is there any way–. Let me try — let me — let me tighten that up. It was an unfair question. Is there a federal Red Flag law you could find yourself supporting?
BUCK [00:04:03] I will not support anything that is called a Red Flag law anymore, because it’s clear that Red Flag laws are due process-taking, presumption of innocence-shifting laws. What I would support is enforcing the laws that we have on the books now, which allow someone to be arrested for a threat, appear before a judge in a preliminary hearing, and their rights to weapons debated at that time. We have laws on the books that aren’t being enforced. The number of firearm cases that have been brought in Chicago, for example, are minuscule. And if you want to enforce the law, go after felons, go after those that have been judged mentally incompetent, and take their guns. But — that’s what the law says –until we enforce the law, we shouldn’t be creating new laws.
CALDARA [00:04:56] You put forward a couple of amendments to this. Amazingly, they were shot down. Go figure that. What did you want to do to this bill that passed through the committee?
BUCK [00:05:10] Well, all I was trying to do is show the Democrats’ hypocrisy. We know who the dangerous people are out there. The gang members are dangerous. And if you want to bring people into court and give them due process and give them a chance to, you know, defend themselves and argue that they’re not dangerous, let’s identify gang members and start enforcing this law on the people that are committing the most violent crimes. Eighty percent of violent crimes in America are committed by gang members. Why aren’t we targeting gang members if we want to reduce gun violence? But the Democrats dislike police officers so much that to have a gang list — as an indicia of gang membership — offends Democrats. And I knew they would vote against it. And they did vote against it. And it was just a pleasure to debate them on the issue, because their hypocrisy was evident to everyone.
CALDARA [00:06:10] So, let me see if I got this right: the people who follow these laws are people like you and I. We follow these laws. But the danger of a Red Flag law, particularly on a federal level or without clear-cut due process, is it really allows someone to make an accusation and disempower somebody else, to take away somebody else’s gun. And I understand if you’re an anti-gunner, that means nothing to you. So you take away the wrong person’s guns — it doesn’t matter. But for someone like me, — [for] who[m] this is a pretty sizable part of my makeup, of who I am –this is a civil liberty that must have due process. So, how do we attack the people who are the problem? I saw a statistic the other day, that mass shootings with so-called assault weapons — more people every year die by having a vending machine fall on them, than die by so-called assault weapons. That tells me that we’re pointing it in the wrong direction.
BUCK [00:07:28] Well, Jon, as someone who can’t walk by a vending machine without buying some chocolate, I would be in favor of banning vending machines. But I do think that assault weapons are not the issue in rural Colorado, that [for] the people that I see on a regular basis, having an AR-15 is not uncommon. It’s a weapon that’s used to shoot raccoons that are harassing and killing chickens. It’s a weapon that’s used to shoot, you know, just prairie dogs, whatever. And that weapon, to be called an assault weapon and to be banned by the Democrats, it’s just — it’s ignorant, frankly, because they talk about it as if it is a weapon used only in war and has no other purpose. And unfortunately, a lot of these people don’t own guns, don’t shoot guns, don’t enjoy hunting and other sports with weapons, and they are–. I can remember when we were debating the issue of suppressors. And Nancy Pelosi kept referring to them as silencers, and talking about how we would never know where a criminal was if they had a silencer on their gun. And it’s just total nonsense. They don’t understand the issue, and have never used a gun with a suppressor to understand that it still makes a loud noise. And an AR-15 has a lot of uses outside of any military uses.
CALDARA [00:09:02] [I’m] a little worried about our president, who seems to be getting soft on the issue of a Red Flag law, or some other type of thing. I understand the call to, quote, “do something” is the [most] dangerous call I’ve ever heard. It’s just, “We’ve got to do something!” Well, not if it makes it worse. What do you — what do you see as a realistic thing — what do you think is a realistic thing to expect from our president, right now? What could pass? What’s in the realm of possibility?
BUCK [00:09:34] So, I think our president is smart, and he’s got a lot of smart people around him. And I think that people understand that the gun is not the issue. What we need to do is we need to identify people that are dangerous, because, 1) they are criminals; 2) they have mental illnesses. And not everybody with a mental illness — just like not everybody with a gun–is going to commit a gun crime. But you know, we have to deal with the prescription drug issue that we’ve got, and the illegal drug issue that we’ve got. We’ve got to deal with single parent families. We’ve got to deal with a broken education system in urban America. There are a lot of issues that are related to this, and I think if the president were to hold a press conference on this issue, I think laying out all those things to the American people and explaining his program to deal with many of those issues would be well respected.
CALDARA [00:10:26] We’ve only got a minute and a half, here. Let me switch gears, because you’re also sitting on a committee that’s dealing with impeachment hearings and other issues. I’ve always found it fascinating that the left keeps pushing this impeachment and keeps widening this. There are some of your colleagues who just will not let this thing go. And part of me wants to say, “Go ahead! Do it! And let’s turn Trump into the next Bill Clinton. He will survive it.” What’s the likelihood of an impeachment?
BUCK [00:10:59] Zero.
CALDARA [00:11:02] When I say — not just removal of office. I’m just talking about an impeachment hearings that — an order of impeachment going to the Senate.
BUCK [00:11:10] Impeachment will never come to the floor of the House, Jon. It will never be voted on the floor of the House. The impeachment itself — the charging of the President itself — will never happen in this Congress. They have no evidence that rises to the level of a high crime or misdemeanor. They have no evidence that suggests that this president has done anything other than trigger the sensibilities of a bunch of very soft people.
CALDARA [00:11:37] You’re saying that with such certainty. I’ve never heard anybody say that clearly. You are absolutely convinced this does not make it to the House floor.
BUCK [00:11:47] I am absolutely convinced. Now, they will try to get as much publicity as they can over the next year and a half. But this does not get it — not make it to the House floor.
CALDARA [00:11:58] Would it help if Republicans said, “We’ll let you vote on it.” Is there any way to push the issue? Because I think it’s an embarrassment.
BUCK [00:12:06] We did push the issue. In fact, most times when you start impeachment hearings in the Judiciary Committee the whole House has considered and authorized the Judiciary Committee to go forward.
