DALLAS (AP) — The State Fair of Texas is laying down a new rule before millions of visitors flock through the gates for corn dogs, deep-fried delights and a friendly wave from a five-story cowboy named Big Tex: No guns allowed.
But that decision by fair organizers — which comes after a shooting last year on the 277-acre fairgrounds in the heart of Dallas — has drawn outrage from Republican lawmakers, who in recent years have proudly expanded gun rights in Texas. On Wednesday, the state’s attorney general threatened a lawsuit unless the fair reversed course.
“Dallas has fifteen days to fix the issue,” said Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, “otherwise I will see them in court.”
Tensions over where and how gun owners can carry firearms in public are frequent in Texas, but the standoff with one of the state’s most beloved institutions has moved the fight onto unusual turf. The fair has not backed down since cowboy hat-wearing organizers announced the new policy at a news conference last week.
The fair, which reopens in September and lasts for nearly a month, dates back to 1886. In addition to a maze of midway games, car shows and the Texas Star Ferris wheel — one of the tallest in the U.S. — the fairgrounds are also home to the annual college football rivalry between the University of Texas and University of Oklahoma. And after Big Tex, the towering cowboy that greets fairgoers, went up in flames in 2012 due to an electrical short, the fair mascot was met with great fanfare upon its return.
Fun fact:
Back in the wild west, it was common to “check your guns” apon entering almost every single town. Yes, you needed protection from bandits and outlaws, but entering you left them with the sheriff and picked them up leaving.
That’s a common sense gun law if I ever saw one.
Too bad the GOP has no common sense anymore, just slop rhetoric they got from some losers who want little girls to get pregnant.
Wyatt Earp enforced such laws and he was about the most manly tough guy you can get. He’s an example of everything they think of as anti-woke and he restricted gun access within city limits.
Funnily enough, usually it was to keep black people and Asian people from being armed while turning a blind eye to armed white people. Gun control is racist.
So is it less racist if everyone’s arms are restricted or if everyone can open carry? Not trying to be an asshole, I’m just not convinced that asking for guns upon entry is inextricable from racism.
Though I suppose policing an an institution in itself is pretty racist since enforcement is often done by authoritarians who are terrified of others. But that’s not really exclusive to policing, unfortunately; most state institutions are racist.
Anyway, I agree with you on some level, but surely there’s an answer here that doesn’t subjugate specific classes of people.
Edit: Then again, it’s in the interest of the state to have a monopoly on violence, so idk what to think. I’m just sick of not doing anything and not having any ideas when man’s shootings happen.
That I don’t know, but I do know that black people made up a huge portion of the cowboys in the wild west. 25% or more. After the Civil War freed slaves rode west. Some settled and built homes, many more became cowboys.
Gun control is racist.
Louder for those in the back. Volumes have been written on the subject, and the information is a only a quick search away.
Many of you are familiar with Reagan, as Governor of California, banning open carry because of the Black Panthers. Yeah, that gets tossed around a good bit, but the racism inherent in historical and modern gun laws goes far deeper.
End racist gun control!
Private event, their rules. Fuck off Paxton. This “good guy with a gun” stuff is bullshit and everyone knows it, but by all means puff out the chest and bluster for the idiots in your constituency.
Surely they’ll allow unrestricted firearms in the gallery at the next Texas legislative session
Ken Paxton is such a piece of shit.
I don’t understand. I went to the Texas state fair last year. They were turning people away at the gate for having folding pocket knives or even Swiss Army knives. There where metal detectors and they where searching bags for weapons of any kind. Who is being banned from carrying guns inside the fair? The police?
Maybe that was after the shooting.
It’s almost like they WANT an incident
I was there the night of the incident last year. I was afraid of a stampede BEFORE the shooting, it was that crowded. Yeah, guns need to be banned or Paxton needs to provide a realistic solution.
Bans like this are straight silly. How exactly do we propose to stop anyone from carrying? Maybe some TSA style security theater? We going to scan thousands of people coming into fairgrounds?
Now people like me will obey the law, and some will not. Now I am unarmed, and they are. People planing mayhem, or people who prone to it, will simply ignore this. And in some states, it’s perfectly legal to carry on private property even if the owners ban it, you can only be forced to leave under threat of trespass. In others, you’re going to jail if caught.
Being a gun nut, I’m leaning towards the latter. If a property owner says, “No.” (to anything), I’m inclined to side with them.
Well, you’ve obviously not been. There are ALREADY metal detectors and you get scanned going in.
How do you “simply ignore” the security screening? Have you never been to a festival or event?
metal detectors? pretty easy since it’s a ticketed event
Good, goood, ban all firearms, so when some nutcase pulls another Uvalde there will be nothing stipping all the fairgoers from getting riddled with bullets while the cops bumble around outside of the gates
as if random civilians with guns wouldn’t bumble around more and also shoot the crowd?
pulls another Uvalde
You mean where the police don’t act and instead stand around? Man it almost seems like law enforcement not acting should be the focus not the fact people are unarmed.
Every event like this will have security with the local PD on alert if they call. That’s how it’s supposed to work - “good guy with gun” often gets shot by police response if you hadn’t been keeping track.
