Like every “mass shooting,” a recent gunfight in Sacramento initially received breathless coverage in the media. But as the sordid details about the suspects became known, coverage of the bloodshed tapered off.

Six people died. It became clear the reason was gang violence. One of the shooters was recently released early from prison – jailed for the felonious assault of his girlfriend – against the recommendation of the parole board. The man was previously convicted on gun charges, and was also awarded a settlement from the state for alleged poor treatment while behind bars.

While devastating – particularly to the families involved – the incident was not amenable to the left-wing/media narrative about guns.

As Project 21 member Craig DeLuz pointed out in a commentary first published by the California Republican Assembly:

[T]here are a number of underlying truths that they will dare not share with the public. Because if they do, it will become clear that they and their policies are not the solution. They are, in fact, the root of the problem.

These truths, he stated, shred the alleged need for “common sense” gun laws.

Here are the truths Craig highlighted that shatter leftist lies:

• It’s a violence problem, and not just guns. “[O]nly recent generations… have concluded that violence is an acceptable way to address the myriad of issues confronting them. The firearm is not the cause of this. In fact, it is not even the weapon of choice.” Most crimes involve other kinds of weapons or none at all. “Guns are no more the cause of this violence,” he wrote, “than cars are the cause of drunk driving.”
• Gun laws are not a crime deterrent. “A 2020 study done as a part of the RAND Corporation’s Gun Policy in America initiative” found “there is zero evidence that gun control laws have any effect on violence in general or gun violence specifically.”
• “Soft on crime” policies are the cause of rising crime. Spiking violent crime in the 90s led to more money for police and harsher sentences for crooks in the form of things like mandatory minimums. This led to a 20-year decline in crime. “While the media and politicians deny the correlation and instead seek to blame guns; the increase in crime, especially violent crime, directly corresponds with the change in our criminal justice policies.”
• Gun control is racial. From “black codes” to California’s “Mulford Act” to gun ownership bans targeting Native Americans and Asians, “[g]un control has always been about keeping “Those People” from being able to own firearms.”

Commenting further on how “the gun debate has always been rooted in racism” with “those who push these policies [being] the true victimizers, Craig explained:

We are often told that young black and brown men are disproportionately impacted by gun violence. But it is rarely noted that young black and brown men are disproportionately the ones pulling the trigger. The sad fact is that people who seek to victimize others (black, white, Latin, Asian, etc.) tend to go after people who look like them.

So, while it is noble to try and reduce the number of young black men in our criminal justice system, we cannot ignore that in doing so, we have put black men, women and children at risk of being their victims.

At the same time, we are limiting the ability of these very same folks to be able to defend themselves from the very danger we have put in their path.

“If we are to ever address the scourge of violence in our streets,” Craig wrote, “it will only happen when we all come to grips with these and many other truths.”