Vote for Trump like your rights depend on it – because they do!

We at Eastmans’ understand that this Op-Ed may very well be “preaching to the choir” but feel that it provides important information for all hunters, shooters and patriotic Americans going into the final weeks before the November election. If you’re one of the hundreds of thousands of hunters and shooters who aren’t registered to vote please get registered and get out and vote this year. The Harris/Walz campaign has not reached out to us in support of 2nd Amendment, hunting and public land rights and issues but as you can see, the Trump/Vance campaign has. Please read into that what you will.  – Ike Eastman, President of Eastmans’ Publishing

By now, most defenders of the 2^nd Amendment have seen the video and pictures of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on his “pheasant hunting” outing earlier this month. In addition to being the running mate to the Democratic candidate for president, Kamala Harris, he also helped bring Elmer Fudd back out of retirement, because Walz looked just like that goofy hunter who so often failed to bag Bugs Bunny in the old Looney Tunes cartoons. 

But while the Fudd character is meant to be funny, there’s nothing humorous about Walz. The campaign rolled him out in his hunting duds in an attempt to obscure the very real threat he and Harris pose to sportsmen and 2A supporters if they get anywhere near the Oval Office. By contrast, my father, Donald J. Trump, would again become the champion we need to protect our rights if he is elected president once more, which is why it is imperative that we spread the word about what’s at stake in the election on November 5.

As you may know, I am an avid outdoorsman and have been one my whole life. As everyone in my family does, I grew up with a healthy respect for firearms, and also the beautiful U.S. Constitution which protects our rights to own and use them responsibly. We use them for sporting purposes, certainly, but we all know that the 2^nd Amendment is about a lot more than just hunting and trap shooting.  

That’s why this election is so important.

Put simply, Harris would be a disaster for gun owners, as she may be the most anti-2^nd Amendment candidate ever to run for president as a major party nominee. If elected, she will most definitely try to restrict our rights and outright seize legally owned weapons from law-abiding citizens. How do we know this? Because she’s tried to do it before.

Going back to her days as the district attorney for San Francisco and attorney general of California, Harris has long been an opponent of the rights of people to legally possess firearms to protect themselves and their families, or to hunt and fish on public lands and waters.

She has forcefully supported a “mandatory buyback program,” which is another way to say “gun confiscation,” and has said she is “proud” that her home state of California has radical gun control laws. Amazingly, she has said that if she is elected president, she will use executive action to take people’s guns in the first 100 days of her administration, and has bragged about law enforcement agents going house to house to seize people’s firearms.

Harris has repeatedly called for a ban on so-called “assault weapons,” a ban on importing AR-15-style firearms, and a ban on high-capacity magazines. She supports raising the minimum age to purchase a rifle, and increasing burdensome red tape and regulations on law-abiding, licensed retailers. And she has called for tightening restrictions on concealed carry permits.

But in what may be the capper to her long list of unconstitutional ideas opposing the legal ownership of firearms, she supported a total ban on handguns in the City of San Francisco. Yes, she wanted to make it illegal to purchase, sell, or possess a handgun in that city, a proposal that is plainly unconstitutional on its face.

Harris doesn’t only want to take your guns away and prevent you from ever owning any, she also wants to limit the places you can use them for hunting. She and President Joe Biden have announced plans for the closure of over 1.3 million acres of public lands to hunters and sport shooters.

Additionally, if they do grudgingly allow you to exercise your constitutional right to bear arms, they want to make it more difficult for you to do so recreationally. They’ve prohibited certain kinds of ammunition on public lands, and have even banned types of fishing tackle.

The differences between Harris and Trump on the issue could not be clearer.

As president, my father signed the largest public lands investment in history, supporting recreational access, protection, and preservation, and permanently conserving outdoor recreation areas for public use. Completely opposite from Harris, he opened and expanded access to more than four million acres of public lands for hunting and fishing across hundreds of national wildlife refuges and fish hatcheries.

Trump signed legislation to ensure that federal lands are open to hunting, fishing, and recreational shooting. He repealed Obama-era prohibitions on hunting and trapping, and added 49 trails to the National Recreational Trails System, spanning 1,645 miles. He reversed the Obama-era ban on traditional lead ammunition and fishing tackle on public lands and waters, and even created a Hunting and Shooting Sports Conservation Council.

And, of course, as president, my father was a staunch 2^nd Amendment ally, defending it from foreign bureaucrats and petitioning the Supreme Court to overturn New York’s unconstitutional restrictions on transporting handguns outside the home (which were ultimately overturned by Trump-appointed justices).

President Trump believes all Americans have a God-given right to protect themselves and their families, and he has proven he will defend law-abiding gun owners and preserve public lands for use by sportsmen and women.

These days, people describe every election as the “most important of our lifetimes,” but the Democratic ticket is so radical – especially in their opposition to the 2^nd Amendment and land use – that it is not an exaggeration to say so. 

On November 5, I urge you to vote for my father, President Donald J. Trump, as though your constitutional rights depend on it. Because they do.  

Donald J. Trump, Jr. is an avid outdoorsman and gun owner, and is the eldest child of the 45^th President of the United States.