[Editor’s Note: Under the aegis of the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, the four candidates for Los Angeles City Attorney in the March 5 primary will participate in a debate this evening at 6 at the Taglyan Cultural Complex, 1201 Vine St., Hollywood.]
Incumbent City Attorney Carmen Trutanich is four-square behind President Obama’s gun control plan, and he fully supports the efforts of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Mayor Villaraigosa and City Councilman Paul Krekorian to ban assault weapons, divest the city’s pension portfolios of firearms-related investments and ban large capacity magazines.
“I’m also for universal background checks, and for real proposals that work to stop the gun tragedy and madness,” said Mr. Trutanich.
“Right now my office is trying to get its hands on data from Sacramento about who in Los Angeles is trying to buy guns illegally.”
Mr. Trutanich is hopeful Sacramento soon will be able share this information with prosecutors – like himself.
“I have also joined with (LAPD Chief) Charlie Beck and state Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris to send a notice to new gun buyers in Los Angeles,” he said, “warning them that they can't sell or give their gun to someone without notifying the state Dept of Justice. The Rand Corp. says this is a program that works.”
Rick Taylor, Mr. Trutanich’s chief strategist, said:
“The man challenging City Attorney Trutanich’s reelection, former state assemblyman Michael Feuer, has portrayed himself as Mr. Gun Control.
“He calls himself the ‘problem-solver-in-chief.’
“But Feuer’s big gun control fix in Sacramento was to write a law to micro-stamp bullets. Whatever that means.
“Mr. Feuer’s big fix was passed two years ago. But it never has been implemented as far as we can tell.
“Maybe it's unworkable, impractical. Even if it is ever implemented, it doesn't look like it would do much, if anything, to stop tragedies like Aurora and Newtown. It’s no mystery who these mass killers were. We don’t need micro-stamped bullets to solve the crime of who pulled the trigger and caused those tragedies.”
“So far, Mr. Feuer’s micro-stamping bullet plan seems like it's more of a gun control stunt, than a solution.
“That,” said Mr, Taylor, “is no surprise coming from a Sacramento politician like Mike Feuer. We wish him well with anything that might work – someday. In the meantime, City Attorney Trutanich is working on real solutions.”
Mr. Schwada may be contacted at john.schwada@gmail.com
