To: Governor Dayton
\nFrom: Mitch Berg
\nRe: Stand Your Ground Bill<\/p>\n
Governor Dayton,<\/p>\n
Do you remember saying this, two years ago<\/a>?<\/p>\n \u201cI have two loaded .357 Magnum pistols in my home right now in a lock box,\u201d DFL candidate Mark Dayton told a crowd gathered Saturday at Game Fair, a hunting and fishing expo in Anoka. \u201cI have a 9mm pistol at home. I have a twelve-gauge shotgun at home.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n You’re not a great politician, but you’re not stupid. \u00a0You were campaigning for governor, outstate, at the Game Fair. \u00a0You remember Ann Wynia; it was the gun vote the sank her and gave us six years of Senator Rod Grams. You know that gun control issues are a graveyard for DFL pols outstate – and not just “sportsman’s” issues, either; you remember the outstate DFL legislators that got sent packing in 2000 and 2002 for opposing Concealed Carry reform. \u00a0And you needed to bounce back from your lifetime “D” rating from the National Rifle Association.<\/p>\n So you went all tactical on us.<\/p>\n So your next steps\u00a0after yesterdays’ resounding passage of the “Stand Your Ground Bill in the Senate<\/a>\u00a0seems pretty clear:<\/p>\n The Senate passed the bill Thursday with bipartisan support<\/strong> in a 40-23 [almost veto-proof…] vote after heated debate.<\/p>\n The bill gives gun owners significantly more latitude to use deadly force for self defense. The bill creates a presumption that anyone who uses deadly force while in a home or dwelling does so believing themselves in danger of harm or death. It expands the definition of dwelling to also mean a hotel room, tent, car or boat.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n It also strengthens Minnesota’s “Castle Doctrine” law – which supposedly exempts one from having to retreat in their own home, but which has been overridden a number of times in Minnesota \u00a0courts.<\/p>\n The usual suspects – Lefty astroturf anti-gun groups and “law enforcement groups”, inevitably groups inextricably tied with metro government – are making the usual bleating sounds:<\/p>\n Supporters of the bill say it will increase personal protection. But opponents say it would actually threaten public safety and increase the risks faced by law enforcement officers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n There are 17 states<\/a> with “Stand Your Ground” Laws, including such conservative bastions as New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Wisconsin. \u00a0There has been no “threat” to anyone’s safety that didn’t have it coming.<\/p>\n No, as the MPR article notes, there is one reason that “law enforcement” – at the institutional level – doesn’t like the bill:<\/p>\n The bill also shifts the burden of proof in self-defense cases from the defense to the prosecution, and would no longer require a person to retreat to avoid a perceived threat.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n