Des Moines, IA — Gun owners in Iowa are celebrating a long-awaited and hard-earned victory after Republican Governor Kim Reynolds signed Constitutional Carry into law yesterday afternoon. The new law goes into effect on July 1st, and would allow Iowans who are legally allowed to own a gun to carry one without having to pay any fees or be listed in a government database.
After signing the bill, Reynolds said, “Today I signed legislation that protects the 2nd Amendment rights of Iowa’s law-abiding citizens while still preventing the sale of firearms to criminals and other dangerous individuals.”
Iowa’s Constitutional Carry bill passed the Iowa House on March 17th by a vote of 60 to 37, and on March 22nd, the bill passed the Senate by a vote of 31 to 17! But then the bill stalled out, as the nation’s establishment media focused on the shooting at a massage parlor in Atlanta, Georgia and the actions of madman Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa who police say is responsible for the massacre at a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, CO.
The Left Wasn’t Happy
Needless to say, the pressure was on for Governor Reynolds: sign the bill and have the left call you a radical gun-loving nutjob…or face the wrath of hundreds of thousands of law-abiding, gun owning Iowans at the ballot box in 2022.
The state’s largest and most powerful gun rights group, Iowa Gun Owners, made sure that Reynolds had no wiggle room. The organization, headed up by Executive Director Aaron Dorr, directed their members and supporters to pound Governor Reynolds’s office with phone calls and emails, assuring her that her fears were well grounded: if she didn’t pass this bill, she’d lose the gun vote for good.
After failing to follow the example of South Dakota’s Governor Kristi Noem during the Corona Scare, Reynolds’s poll numbers showed she didn’t have the luxury of ticking off every gun owner in the state after they’d worked hard to get this legislation to pass both the House and Senate.
The grassroots pressure worked beautifully! After a ten day wait, Governor Reynolds finally signed the bill late yesterday afternoon.
Iowa’s Rank And File Gun Owners Got It Done
In a year when Joe Biden and the swamp monsters in Washington, D.C. are trying harder than ever to crush gun rights, this effort is a victory for gun owners all across the country. And it’s proof positive that an army of grassroots gun owners can have a HUGE impact on the political process if they’re given the chance.
Thanks to the untiring work of Iowa Gun Owners, grassroots gun owners fought hard not only in this final push, but over several election cycles! They consistently targeted legislators at the ballot box who were standing in the way of advancing gun rights — on either side of the aisle.
After Iowa Gun Owners’ members and supporters had cleared the field of nearly two dozen legislators, the rest of the people at the Capitol got the message: selling out on gun rights doesn’t fly in Iowa, anymore.
Well done, Iowa! Well done.