SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California punched back Friday against two recent landmark US Supreme Court decisions as Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a contentious, first-in-the-nation gun control law patterned after a Texas anti-abortion law and urged other states to follow suit.
Newsom stitched the two hot-button topics together in approving a law allowing people to sue anyone who distributes illegal assault weapons, parts that can be used to build weapons, guns without serial numbers or .50-caliber rifles.
“We’re sick and tired of being on the defense in this movement,” he said.
“It’s time to put them on the defense. You cannot sell, you cannot manufacture, you cannot transfer these illegal weapons of war and mass destruction in the state of California. And if you do, there are 40 million people that can collect $10,000 from you, and attorney fees, for engaging in that illegal activity.”
Lawmakers patterned the bill, at Newsom’s request, after a Texas law allowing citizens to sue anyone who provides or assists in providing an abortion. The Supreme Court gave preliminary approval to the Texas law, but California’s law will automatically be invalidated if the Texas law is ever ruled unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court’s support for the Texas law was “a terrible decision,” Newsom said. However, “if they’re going to use this framework to put women’s lives at risk, we’re going to use it to save people’s lives here in the state of California.”
Newsom also placed $30,000 worth of full-page advertisements in three Texas newspapers Friday criticizing what he said is Gov. Greg Abbott’s hypocrisy on gun safety. The ads parrot a comment by Abbott about children’s right to life but substitute “gun violence” where he said “abortion.”
A combination of gun owner advocates and the American Civil Liberties Union have criticized Newsom for creating what they said