Turns Out Vice Presidents Are Important, After All: Meet J.D. Vance’s 2A Record

For decades, America has treated Vice Presidents as literal “also-rans.” This was a mistake. Let’s not make it again.

Our general disregard for the importance of the VP role extends to both sides of the aisle, and it’s something of a running joke in American politics. We like to tot up the flaws of the vice presidential candidate and chuckle that this person is “insurance” against assassination attempts, because (we imply) they’re so incompetent that no politically motivated assassin would allow them to ascend to the presidency. As millions of registered Democrats are currently discovering, it’s rather unwise to put all of one’s eggs into one basket case.

Basket case in point: Kamala Harris. Even the most ardent Democratic party loyalists are oddly silent about her, even as they bandy around ideas for re-nominating a new Democratic candidate for President. The party hacks in the press just couldn’t get enough of her in 2020, singing her praises to the sky. Now, with four years of understudying Biden on her resume, she should be a shoo-in to replace her ailing boss. And yet both the pols and the pundits went straight to Gretchen Whitmer and Gavin Newsom as possible replacements for Joe Biden (should God come and tell Joe to step down, that is).

Isn’t that strange? It’s almost as if the VP is more than just a placeholder, and that the job is more than attending boring state events that the President doesn’t have time for.

This, it seems, is why former President Trump has selected the 39-year-old J.D. Vance as his running mate. He is explicitly planning Vance as a valid replacement for himself should he become incapacitated. That, as we have all just been reminded in the most terrifying way, is extremely important.

It’s also very important for us as Second Amendment supporters to go through Vance’s record carefully, because (as you may have noticed), Trump has removed the 2A plank from the Republican platform. We need to know where his heart lies on the question of civilian gun ownership. The National Shooting Sports Foundation has done the research, and given its blessing. Here’s what you need to know.

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FORMER PRESIDENT TRUMP’S PICK OF U.S. SEN. J.D. VANCE A SOLID SECOND AMENDMENT CHOICE

By Larry Keane

Former President and presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump announced U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) as his vice presidential nominee on the first day of the official Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Sen. Vance has been in the U.S. Senate since 2023 and was well-known prior to running for office for his 2016 memoir Hillbilly Elegy.

In naming Sen. Vance his running mate for the 2024 election, former President Trump has tapped a strong Second Amendment stalwart and someone who proudly stands with the firearm industry and law-abiding Americans from coast-to-coast who believe in exercising their Constitutional rights to keep and bear arms.

Solid Track Record

While he’s only been in the U.S. Senate for 18 months, Sen. Vance brought a strong personal background and pro-Second Amendment stance with him. As is well known from his book, Sen. Vance grew up in Ohio and served in the U.S. Armed Forces as a U.S. Marine, serving a tour in Iraq.

In 2022, Sen. Vance challenged U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) for the Senate seat being vacated by retiring U.S. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio). During his debates with Rep. Ryan, Sen. Vance made it known he’d support law-abiding Ohioans and their ability to legally purchase firearms. He noted at the time the surge in crime was responsible for violence that worried Ohioans who saw criminals disregarding the law. Soft-on-crime prosecutors were refusing to hold criminals accountable for their crimes, Sen. Vance argued during one debate.

“I’m a big pro-Second Amendment guy and I know a lot of people who will strongly, stridently defend the Second Amendment. None of them think convicted felons, who have been afforded their Due Process rights should be able to buy firearms and then kill people. But here’s the thing – the reason why we have skyrocketing gun violence in this country is because Democrats and Tim Ryan are [deciding] to declare war on America’s police,” Sen. Vance shot back to Rep. Ryan. “We didn’t have it two years ago, five years ago, and nothing significantly changed in the gun laws.”

Sen. Vance continued, saying, “We need to fix the system we have that has problems as opposed to layering on a bunch of new regulations and laws on top of it. The thing that I don’t like is when you create a new background check system with new sets of regulations that go after law-abiding citizens.”

An Industry Friend Now

Since he took over as The Buckeye State’s junior senator, Sen. Vance has kept those promises to revere the Second Amendment. And his Senate track record of support of firearm industry priorities demonstrate he’ll be a staunch ally in The White House, especially compared to the current vice president.

Sen. Vance has led and lent his name in support as a co-sponsor of pro-industry, pro-Second Amendment legislation including S. 214, the Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act; S. 410, the Hearing Protection Act, to remove firearm suppressors from the list of regulated items under the National Firearms Act (NFA); S. 293, the NSSF-priority Fair Access to Banking Act; and also S. 2736, the successful bipartisan Congressional effort to block President Biden’s Department of Education from prohibiting funding from going to youth recreational shooting sports and hunter education training programs.

In addition, Sen. Vance was also a strong supporter of Congressional efforts to block the Biden administration’s continued whole-of-government attack on the lawful firearm industry. That includes co-sponsoring Congressional Review Act (CRA) S.J. Res. 93 to block the Bureau of Industry and Security’s (BIS) Final Rule to severely restrict the export of certain firearms and firearm accessories, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) unlawful expansion of the definition of who qualifies as “engaged in the business” of selling firearms, and also the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) redefining of a pistol with a stabilizing arm brace attached as a “short-barreled rifle” under NFA restrictions.

Those bills and CRAs are currently being held in the Senate by Sen. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). However, the election in November will possibly bring with it a change in Senate majority control which could mean all those efforts could move forward and possibly be signed into law with a President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance in The White House.

There are about three and a half months to go before Election Day 2024. The party tickets are set and the campaigns are picking up.

NSSF encourages all Second Amendment supporters, hunters, recreational target shooters and self-defense advocates to #GUNVOTE® in November so they don’t risk their rights.