State doctors’ group calls for more gun control, repeal of Second Amendment ‘sanctuary’ law; passes resolutions on many topics

The Kentucky Medical Association called mass shooting and gun violence “a public-health crisis” and called for more gun control in one of nine resolutions on the topic at its annual convention.

Voting delegates representing the state’s doctors also adopted resolutions addressing sex education, abortion care and more at their meeting Aug. 25-27 in Louisville.

Kentucky has the “14th-highest rate of gun deaths” in the nation, according to one of the resolutions.

KMA joined several other groups in declaring the public-health crisis, in a resolution that supports “A ban of assault (semi-automatic) weapons and killing-enhancement features, including high-capacity magazines, rapid-fire increases (‘bump stocks’), silencers, and guns without serial numbers (‘ghost’ and 3-D printed guns).”

The resolution also calls for background checks without loopholes, waiting periods and safety training on all firearm transfers (retail, internet, gun-show purchases, lending and gifts); and extreme-risk protective orders (‘red flag’ laws) “to disarm persons who pose risks of gun violence to self or others.”

Before the convention, Alex Acquisto of the Lexington Herald-Leader talked to KMA Executive Vice President Patrick Padgett about how KMA passes resolutions and what it means.

Padgett said the association, by definition, is an advocacy organization to promote the well-being of patients, doctors and the community at large, and the resolutions represent the consensus of an organization that represents thousands of doctors statewide. Padgett said KMA members regularly conduct grassroots advocacy with legislators about health-related bills.

The group’s rules say any KMA member can propose a policy change, which is then reviewed by a group of more than 100 doctors in KMA’s House of Delegates, which votes on resolutions in deliberations that are closed to the public. KMA is a private organization, not a public agency coveregd by the state Open Meetings Act.

Acquisto notes that the KMA’s suggested firearm legislation goes against the long-prevailing views in the General Assembly.

Other resolutions support creation of a statewide gun-safety office to reduce firearm-related deaths;  eliminating ghost-gun loopholes; supporting legislation that promotes the implementation of “domestic violence prohibition laws;” screening during medical visits for presence of guns in the home; and research and educational campaigns about firearms, including safe storage.

“Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, has called for the legislature to pass  to this end multiple times since he became governor — as far back as 2019 after two mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, left dozens of people dead, and again this year, after a gunman in downtown Louisville killed five people,” Acquisto reports.

Such laws are not popular “in a state that has historically championed the proliferation of and freedom to possess firearms,” she adds. “Beshear’s predecessor, Republican Gov. Matt Bevin, said in 2019 that red flag laws are an ‘erosion of our constitutional rights’ and signed” into a law a bill repealing the requirement for a separate permit or training to carry a concealed deadly weapon.

“In 2020, a bipartisan bill to enact a red-flag law in Kentucky failed to get traction,” Acquisto notes. “Earlier this year, legislators enacted a law making Kentucky a ‘Second Amendment Sanctuary’ state.”

The legislation, which Beshear allowed to become law without his signature, says local and state officials and their employees shall not “enforce, assist in the enforcement of, or otherwise cooperate in the enforcement of a federal ban on firearms, ammunition, or firearm accessories.”