GOP senators want to arm Arizona college students … with guns

Opinion: Of all the bad ideas swirling around the Arizona Legislature, surely the bill to allow guns on college campuses is among the worst. College students should be packing books, not pistols.

It’s an annual rite of passage at the state Capitol: What can we do this year to get guns into __________ (fill in the blank)?

This year’s arming-Arizona bill is brought, as it has been so many times before, by Sen. Wendy Rogers, R-Flagstaff, or possibly Tempe or more likely Chandler.

This (supposedly) northern Arizona Republican is urging the GOP-run Legislature to pass a bill that would allow college students to bring their guns onto campus, provided they’re 21, have passed a background check and undergone two whole hours of firearms training.

That’s not two hours a quarter or even two hours a year, by the way. It’s two hours, period. And you don’t even have to demonstrate that you know how to shoot a gun.

“If you have a concealed carry permit you should be able to carry on campus to defend yourself,” Rogers told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday.

NAU shooting proves what can go wrong

I mean, what could go wrong?

I’d ask Steven Jones but he is unavoidably detained in a prison cell in Safford.

Jones was a student at Northern Arizona University in the fall of 2015, when an early morning fight broke out at a fraternity party and spilled onto campus. Accounts differ, as they always do, but Jones would later tell police he was being chased by a group of drunken, angry students from a rival fraternity. Fearing for his life, he ran to his car, which was parked just outside his dorm, and grabbed his gun.

Jones’ first burst of shots hit Colin Brough and another student. He then fired again, wounding two others, after a group of students tackled him.

The students told police they were trying to stop Jones from shooting anyone else. Jones said he believed they were trying to get his gun so they could shoot him.

When it was over, Brough was dead, three other students were wounded and Jones was a convicted felon, wishing he could trade his life for the one he took.

It marked the first time a shooting had ever happened on the Flagstaff campus.

Concealed carry doesn’t belong on campus

Senate Bill 1198 would allow anyone with a concealed weapons permit to pack heat on a public college or university campus in Arizona.

Naturally, the bill is opposed by college and university police departments, knowing as they do that 20-somethings are prone to all manner of stressful situations in which a gun is the absolute last thing they need.

Republican senators, however, scoffed at that, saying students need to be able to protect themselves from rapists and mass murderers and such.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Anthony Kern was particularly excited about the bill, announcing to those present that he was packing his pistol and ready for action.

“I’m carrying right now and I can tell you if somebody came in here shooting, they would be my first target,” the Glendale Republican said.

Perhaps Kern really is that good.

Perhaps that two hours of training required to get a concealed weapons permit included at least a few minutes on how to safely shoot in that stress-packed, adrenaline-pumping moment when a bad guy bursts in to Kern’s hearing room.

Even police officers can make mistakes

Me? I’d be more inclined to put my money on his fellow Judiciary colleague, Sen. Justine Wadsack, R-Tucson. I’ve seen her strike a pose outside the Capitol with her assault-style weapon — in high heels, no less — so I’d be feeling pretty good about my chances with her in the room.

But I digress.

Police officers train regularly for that high stress moment when duty calls. Even then, they make mistakes.

“The assumption that somebody can take (a class), particularly a civilian, and be a competent shooter in a combat situation is misplaced,” Mike Bielecki, representing the Maricopa County Community College Faculty Association, told the committee.

Last year: Prescott lawmakers jump to save Phoenix’s guns

But Kern wasn’t having it, noting that college campuses are violent places and that laws are lax.

“If you shoot up 30 people you’re out in two years,” he said. “You see it every day in our media. Assaults on police officers from illegals from across the border, so absolutely, 100%, I think everybody in this room should be carrying. An armed society is a safe society.”

And a Senate Judiciary Committee armed with intellect is …. non-existent, it seems.

Gov. Hobbs will veto the bill, at least

I don’t know of anyone who was set free after shooting up 30 people, as Kern claims, and I don’t see how telling college kids to bring their Glocks to class protects police officers. Or really, anyone.

But here’s what I do know. This bill will be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs, just as it was last year.

Despite that, it passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 4-3 party line vote, with Rogers noting that gun-free zones send a message to the bad guys.

“Where is safest place in Arizona?” she asked. “A gun show.”

Yet I note that not even a sharpshooter like Kern could come packing to a gun show. Not legally, anyway.

Gun shows don’t allow loaded weapons.

Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LaurieRoberts.

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