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Editorial: Putnam aims to be Florida's gun governor

 
OCTAVIO JONES   |   Times
The leading Republican candidate for governor, Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, supports the NRA's absurd push for guns to be allowed on college campuses and openly carried in public places.
OCTAVIO JONES | Times The leading Republican candidate for governor, Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, supports the NRA's absurd push for guns to be allowed on college campuses and openly carried in public places.
Published July 21, 2017

The National Rifle Association owns the Florida Legislature lock, stock and barrel. It should not own the next governor. Yet the leading Republican candidate, Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, supports the NRA's absurd push for guns to be allowed on college campuses and openly carried in public places. That is the wrong direction for Florida, where there already are too many guns and state law encourages a shoot-first approach.

Putnam sounded more like an NRA mouthpiece than a statewide elected official last week as he endorsed changing state law to allow firearms on university and college campuses and the open-carry of guns on the streets. In a Facebook post, he also criticized protesters in Tampa for objecting to an unsettling NRA ad that attacks gun control advocates and argues the "only way we stop this … is to fight this violence of lies with a clinched fist of truth.'' In fact, Putnam's Facebook page last week included several posts about guns, including one listing five reasons why he is the best candidate for governor for gun owners.

If he wants to move into the Governor's Mansion, Putnam should expand his horizons. He should listen to the presidents of the state's public universities, who all have opposed changing state law to allow guns on campuses. He should walk up the street from his Capitol office and talk to Florida State University president John Thrasher, who could remind him of how much worse a 2014 shooting incident at FSU might have been if police had been unable to quickly identify the shooter because everybody else also had guns. He could reach out to police officials and college administrators in other states where shootings have occurred and ask them how those situations could have been made worse with more guns.

Putnam should talk to tourism industry officials and see if they are willing to risk scaring away visitors and jeopardizing their multibillion-dollar industry by allowing guns to be carried in the open. He should talk to other business leaders and ask them how comfortable they would be if customers showed up with guns tucked into their belts or a holster. Putnam's argument that he is interested in allowing nearly 1.8 million people with concealed weapons permits more opportunities to "exercise their Second Amendment rights" rings hollow to millions of other Floridians.

If he were interested in making the state safer rather than sucking up to the NRA, Putnam would be more concerned about the rising number of children injured or killed by guns as gun sales and concealed weapons permits increase. He would support legislation that would require the use of a safe or a trigger lock when children are around. He would oppose the "stand your ground'' law that makes it easier to shoot someone and claim immunity. And if he is so concerned about constitutional rights, he should get behind a constitutional amendment that would automatically restore the voting rights of most felons after they have completed their sentences.

Putnam declares "there is absolutely a pathway for Florida to get to a form of open carry'' for firearms. That is absolutely not the pathway to the Governor's Mansion.