Author Archives: TMM

Initially it seemed like a misunderstanding though the response from the president makes it obvious who they support and who they hate.

Thanks for posting this email. I just received a concerned telephone call about it, an email from the staffer who stimulated the mail.

I think a bit of clarification is in order.

The root of the matter is a HUGE series of inquiries by both email and telephone asking ArmaLite to cut off sales to New York and other states which deny its citizens the right to own our rifles, as several other firms have done. Some of the contacts have been duplicates of others and some were so redundant that they appeared to be spam. Many of them have been rude and I’m afraid one of my staffers thought that he was responding to a spammer and was more terse than he should have been. Once he realized what happened he came to me and apologized.

My purpose here is to pass on his apology from the corporate level and to answer the initial question: What is ArmaLite going to do?

ArmaLite is continuing a policy put into place when California first banned our rifles. That policy remains:

1. We will not sell to those states which deny it’s honorable citizens the right to own ArmaLite’s.

2. We do not halt sales to individual officers even in problematic states. I am a former Police Officer myself, and the staffer who stimulated the recent anger is a currently serving one. We are well familiar with the fact that most rifles serving Police Officers are purchased by the officers themselves, and that they shouldn’t be punished for the actions of their political elite. 
We consider sales to those sate subdivisions which are not engaged or potentially engaged with disarming its citizens. DNR and Forestry Departments, for instance, sometimes serve in remote areas that conceal drug farms and their officers deserve good hardware. 

3. We will not sell to those lower political subdivisions that deny their honorable citizens the right to own ArmaLite’s. Chicago, for instance, prohibits its citizens from owning ArmaLite’s within the city limits so we make no effort to sell into that city. We have many friends on the Chicago Police Department and have continued to sell to them individually.

Our observation is that most County Sheriffs disagree with banning sales of our rifles and many publicly refuse to enforce such laws. We sell to those departments and to their Deputies, but will not sell to those County departments headed by Sheriffs who would deny their citizens the same rights.

In short, Americans need not worry that ArmaLite is selling to those who betray them.

As you can see by reading posts on the topic, some readers have been harsh with their criticism of ArmaLite. It was in response to this atmosphere that my staffer reacted harshly. He’s come to me and apologized and I personally am passing my own apology along with his.

But don’t be mistaken, ArmaLite is strongly involved with both personal, corporate, and political efforts at the State, National, and International level to protect our civil rights. And we’ll continue to support your shooting needs as the situation moves forward.

Respectfully,
Mark Westrom
President,
ArmaLite Inc.

Let me translate points 2 and 3 for everyone.:

1. We will not sell to those states which deny it’s honorable citizens the right to own ArmaLite’s with the following exceptions.** 

2. Thankfully when states decide to intrude on the right of citizens to own arms, they exempt those who work for law enforcement.  Therefor we will continue to sell firearms to individuals who work in law enforcement.  While not being sold to the department, the states allow them to have arms that are otherwise outlawed from the rest of the citizenry.  We are perfectly fine with this discrepancy and honestly welcome and encourage it.  It is much easier to abuse citizens when we have a monopoly on force.

3.  Even if for some reason police officers are prohibited from ownership, we instead will sell to the political body that created the regulation.  In so doing we are helping to ensure that the political body is the only group effectively armed and can abuse it’s citizenry as it pleases.  Even better though is the fact that many of our arms can be stolen off the trains, whereby criminals can also be armed meaning the political body continues buying even more firearms from us.  Sure the law-abiding may be caught in the cross fire but honestly who cares right?  If you want to make a socialist utopia  you need to break a few eggs.

*When county sheriff’s protest the banning of our rifles we will feign support by continuing to sell to them but not sell to other departments that would deny citizens those same rights.*

**What we really mean is we will purely abide by the law and screw you the law-abiding citizen while continuing the hypocrisy of arming those who get a exemption by their employment.

Now I put that section in stars because honestly I don’t know how that section can reconcile with the previous two.  Tell me, if they’re going to stop selling to sheriffs who don’t support the right to arms, why are they going to continue selling to other places they don’t?  The answer is simple, they aren’t willing to put their money where their mouth is regarding the right to keep and bear arms.

They see the government as a bigger cash cow than the civilian market.  They could have handled this situation considerably better, but they sunk that ship instead.  Trying to feign support is never a good idea as it makes you look like a sell out, which is exactly how they look.  If they had said they would only sell to departments they would have been in a much better position.  Point 2 though shows them as the hypocrites they are. 

ArmaLite has now taken the position on my list that Smith and Wesson once had.