No guns in the movement? DeWine’s hypocrisy is showing

After ICE shot and killed Alex Pretty in Minneapolis, I’m seeing right-wing politicians backpedaling on their gung-ho gun message.

Pretti was a licensed concealed carry holder and did not engage in violence, did not threaten armed agents and did not appear to draw his gun at any point during his fatal interaction with the agents. By all accounts, he had the right to have a gun in protest and did not use it irresponsibly. Yet legally owning a gun appears to be a major factor in ICE agents viewing him as a threat and justifying his killing.

Now, politicians are exposing their hypocrisy.

Once staunch gun rights advocates are scathing in ways they uphold the Second Amendment, warning protesters not to bring guns to their demonstrations.

Our own Gov. Mike DeWine, who legalized “constitutional carry” in 2022, warned citizens not to bring guns as ICE landed in Springfield, where thousands of Haitian immigrants will lose their temporary protected status on Tuesday.

But what is constitutional about the freedom to carry only for some, for some time?

“You know, the purpose of the demonstration is to demonstrate your position and try to get a point across,” DeWine told USA Today Network’s Ohio outlets earlier this week. “And I think you can do that without a gun, but again, they have the right to have a gun.”

There are plenty of things you can do without a gun: go grocery shopping, walk the streets, go to the state fair.

Although those are all places I’ve seen people carry, they’re all operating under the assumption that they won’t get killed for it.

For years, die-hard gun rights advocates have touted the Second Amendment as a safeguard against government tyranny — something I’ve argued federal immigration agents are on the verge of engaging in now as they unjustly kill American citizens like Pretty and, earlier this month in Minneapolis, Renee Goode.

It’s the same justification Caitlin Bennett, known as the “Kent State Gun Girl,” used to launch open-carry protests in 2018 at Kent State University, where the National Guard killed four students in what Bennett infamously called a “government tyranny” in the 1970s.

But now that protesters are on the other side of the political aisle, politicians are retreating from a principle they once vociferously defended.

Let me be abundantly clear. Do I, as an individual, believe that someone should take up a gun to protest? Absolutely not. I don’t believe the average person should carry a gun in public and doing so always carries a quiet threat of violence, whether it’s at a protest or in the grocery store.

I understand that DeWine is trying to prevent more needless deaths at the hands of the government. But gun control is off in the state; People carry their guns wherever they are not expressly prohibited.

DeWine instead needs to direct his message at the federal government, promoting policies that limit ICE overreach and hold federal agents accountable if they violate constitutional rights.

DeWine, of course, isn’t the only conservative suddenly pushing an anti-gun message.

Donald Trump’s hypocrisy comes as a surprise — no surprise, really. He also asked the protestors to keep their guns from the protest.

I think his advocacy for the Second Amendment only applies when it supports his message line, whether it’s laying eggs in attendance at the Prod Boys protest or watching from the sidelines as his supporters storm the Capitol.

Conservatives, listen to what the people you vote for are telling you: Our Second Amendment rights are only guaranteed for a while.

But freedom is not selective. The Second Amendment is for all Americans – even those who don’t agree with you.

So, what do you think? Email me at tbennett@usatodayco.com to let me know.

This article originally appeared in the Akron Beacon Journal: No guns at protests? Ohio Gov. DeWine’s hypocrisy is showing opinion