New Mexico Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham defended her 30-day emergency “public health” order banning guns in and around Albuquerque during an interview Tuesday on CNN.
“It’s not for the police to tell me what’s constitutional or not. They haven’t supported one, not one, gun violence effort in the State of New Mexico… It’s not a ban, it’s a temporary pause to make our communities safer,” Lujan Grisham said.
CNN’s Harlow asked: “Do you think you’re on solid constitutional ground here?”
“I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t think I had the right. I have the right,” Grisham said.
CNN’s Poppy Harlow also asked: “How are you not in violation of both the U.S. Constitution and your state’s constitution?”
“I don’t believe that we are,” Grisham said. “And if that narrow reading of the constitution, which has been tested in the state, we wouldn’t have universal background checks, we wouldn’t have a waiting period, we wouldn’t have a red flag law, we wouldn’t have prohibitions for straw purchases. None of those would have been deemed constitutional. And today all of them are.”