Virginia’s Democrat Attorney General, Mark Herring, is having his campaign accounts boosted by massive sums of money from numerous outside anti-gun groups.
The gun control group that calls itself Everytown for Gun Safety, a group that is majorly funded by the former New York City’s mayor and the billionaire Michael Bloomberg, announced on Monday that it would be putting an additional $300,000 behind the reelection bid of Herring, bringing the total commitment to Herring to a staggering sum of $600,000. Everytown also has given a total of $1,100,000 to elect the Democrat Ralph Northam as governor and $100,000 towards the electing of Democrat Justin Fairfax lieutenant governor.
John Adams is a former federal prosecutor for U.S. Attorney’s office, and is running opposite Herring for the elections, says about Herring that, “He is a political animal. He’s been playing politics with the law in Virginia and it’s just not right. He’s an ideological warrior in the attorney general’s office. He’s got a strong ideology and he’s not afraid to use the power of his office to further his agenda.”
Adams also said that the support from Everytown is likely a result of Herring’s attempt to unilaterally void all of Virginia’s gun carry reciprocity agreements with all the other states last year.
In the wake of the Democrats’ failure to recapture either the Virginia House of Delegates or the Senate, Herring and Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe both are taking unilateral actions on the gun control. Herring’s attempt to end this reciprocity agreements was met with a lot of backlash.
“Bloomberg was one of Herring’s biggest donors in the last election and then you saw him take this action as attorney general to void our reciprocity agreements for concealed carry permits with other states,” Adams had said. “Given the fact that Herring did that in his first term, it’s not surprising that they’re coming back in with significant funding for him in the second go around.”
The legislature had eventually struck a deal with McAuliffe to reverse the Herring’s action, strip him of the power to eventually make or eliminate reciprocity deals, and expand the recognition of the gun carry permits to all the states.
“The move was so extreme that even Terry McAuliffe overruled him, striking a deal with Republicans for a statutory fix to what Herring had done,” Adams had said.
Adams also said that Herring’s action on reciprocity deals was one made based on politics, not law.”It was a pro-active political move at the behest of the anti-gun movement,” Adams further argued.
“The reason it is appropriate to classify it as a political move, it did not come to Herring’s attention that states were giving people permits in a way that is weaker than the way that Virginia does—there was none of that,” he had said. “It was instigated by a political, not a factual, mechanism. This was a political move by anti-gun groups who came up with this plan to stop reciprocity.”
“It’s stunning that McAuliffe quickly worked with the Republicans to fix it,” Adams continued. “They actually broadened reciprocity. The day they rolled that out the attorney general was nowhere to be found on the stage. It was a stunning rebuke to him by his governor.”
“I believe as the attorney general of Virginia you’re duty-bound to serve your role as the lawyer for the commonwealth of Virginia and defend the laws the citizens pass through the legislature,” he added. “When you’re elected as attorney general, you’re not elected to be a super legislator.”
“The best example of Herring’s politicization of the office is right to work laws,” he concluded. “Virginia has been a right to work state for a long time, and it has had bipartisan support here. Herring went to the Supreme Court and filed an amicus brief saying that California teachers should have been required to join a union to teach kids. He is going to the Supreme Court arguing against the law and policy in Virginia, where we’ve decided to be a right to work state.”