Guns'N'Campuses

Rep. Driver: Somebody get this man a copy of Old School

Less than a week after the Senate Criminal Justice committee voted out their "bring a gun to work" bill, the lege is at it again. Amongst all the giggling over who does or doesn't carry a gun on the floor, the House Public Safety committee took a long night of public testimony on House Bill 1893, overturning the current (completely constitutional) ban on concealed handguns on university campuses.

In his introduction, bill author Rep. Joe Driver, R-Garland, did the old "the reporting has been inaccurate and misleading" routine. He then went on to make some interesting claims himself.

Driver claimed HB 1893 wouldn't affect students because Texas law restricts concealed handgun ownership to people 21 and up. Someone should tell Driver that 12,000 of the 48,000 students at UT Austin are graduates: Add on around 16,500 staff and faculty, plus all the seniors and mature students over 21, and that's actually over a third of the campus and over a quarter of all students who could potentially apply for concealed handgun licenses.

For the record, UT Student Government, the Graduate Student Assembly, the Senate of College Councils, the UT Faculty Council, the UT System Faculty Association plus LeTourneau, Texas Christian, Texas Wesleyan Law School and St. Edwards private universities are all against the bill.