Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher - Ep 269 | Living in 40 Acres | Guest: Cam Edwards

Episode Date: December 14, 2019

Today's show is SPECIAL because host of 40 Acres and a Fool, Cam Edwards joins Jeffy to discuss his American Dream and the latest surrounding 2A Sanctuary cities around Virginia.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So joining us on Chewing the Fat is my man, Cam Edwards. Cam, welcome to Chewing the Fat. It's good to talk to you again. Thanks for coming on. I know you've been busy. Oh, man, it was a pleasure. I know you've been busy. Yeah, I was a pleasure.

You're still doing 40 acres and a mule for the Blaze podcast, right? Cool. 40 acres in a pool. Yeah, that's what I said. 40 acres and a mule. Wait a minute. Your farm doesn't have a mule? Will you not have a mule?

I feel like we have a mule. I have a couple of jackasses, but I know. Thank you. Thank you. I feel like we've covered this before. but I'm still disappointed that you haven't gotten a mule. And that's very disappointing to me, but you know, you don't care. Every time we think about it, every time we think about it, we just end up getting more baby goats instead.

Well, goats are, you know, more productive probably than a mule, really. And cuter, yeah. Yeah, a lot cuter, no question. All right, so, Cam, you have been covering the state of Virginia coming to get your guns, debacle that is happening. and I find it fascinating that they, A, what was the turning point that made them think, you know what? We can do this. Because if one state does it, then other states start to think, hey, we can do that too.

So what was the turning point? Yeah, I think the turning point was this summer. We had the shooting in Virginia Beach at the municipal complex. 12 people were killed. And gun control advocates and politicians really seized on that and said, said, you know, we need these quote unquote common sense gun laws. And they made that a central theme of their campaign. We had elections in November.

So every legislative seat in Virginia was up for grabs in both the state assembly in the state Senate. And they ended up taking back the legislature, which had been controlled by Republicans. And so now for the first time in 26 years, Democrats are in complete control of state government in Virginia. They believe that they have a mandate to pass these types of guns. bands and that's exactly what they're trying to do. So they're actually talking about not registration, but they're coming, if you, they're coming

door to door and taking your guns. Are they talking about that or are they saying, hey, we're going to ask you to turn them in? Well, so here's what's interesting. So there's a bill called Senate Bill 16. It's been introduced by the incoming Senate Majority Leader. So it's not some, you know, random legislator that has the backing, I think, of the Democratic party and it banned the possession the continued possession of any gun that they deemed a quote unquote assault weapon now what we've seen from governor northman so and so by the way there was no

provision jesse jeffy and how they were going to get these guns just you could not continue to own them uh we saw governor ralph northam on monday come out and say well you know i think we're going to have a clause in there that says if you currently own these guns you can keep them you just have to register them with the state oh that's nice i i don't yeah right i don't know if you really thought that gun owners were going to be satisfied with that. No, okay, well, that's all better now. But that's absolutely not what has happened because we've seen in other states, you know, once these registrations get put in place, then all of a sudden the next step is, well, now you can't own them anymore. Right. And we know you've got

them. Exactly. Exactly. So I, that's where we are right now. We've got the governor saying, no, no, we're not going to ban the possession of guns. I think that there may be a fight in the legislature between Democrats over how far they want to go. If the, you know, the beta or work style Mr. and Mrs. Virginia turn him in or give you some money for it. If there's some sort of compensated confiscation program that becomes attached to this, but I can tell you, I mean, I just don't think that there is any stomach among Republicans in the legislature. And I'm very curious about a couple of these rural Democrats as to whether or not they actually want to take this step. I suspect that this bill will pass.

I suspect that they'll be signed by Governor Norseman in whatever form. it ultimately ends up in. But right now, there's sort of a, I think there's a real divide among Democrats about how far they want to go. Yes, they absolutely want it infringed on the right to keep them bear arms. But because of the Second Amendment sanctuary movement

that we've seen pop up in the state, they're also, I think, really starting to get worried about the pushback here. Okay, and that's where I was headed next. So since they've done this, local municipalities have, and counties and cities, is it just cities or is it counties as well?

that have come together and said, hey, okay, so we're going to become sanctuary areas, right? Yeah, and it's mostly counties. There's been a few cities that have cast their vote, but right now I think the total, well, let me put it this way. By Thursday morning, we should have more than 80 locations in Virginia. The vast majority of them are going to be counties. But you also do have a few cities, Chesapeake, Virginia, which is down in the door from Virginia Beach area.

They improved a resolution. I think Martinsville, Virginia, approved a resolution this week. But yeah, I mean, it's been incredible to watch. I mean, I've been covered the Second Amendment for 15 years, and I've never seen anything like this. I mean, I've gone to probably eight different county board of supervisors meetings. And, you know, ordinarily, you might get a dozen people there, right, to pay attention to what the county is doing. We're seeing, last night I was in this little county called Cumberland County,

about 10,000 people. as I drove into Cumberland Courthouse, which is the county seat, there's a little Mexican restaurant that I eat at occasionally and Tuesday is Taco Tuesday. And the restaurant is always... And occasionally you know that that takes place on Tuesday. Right?

And so as I'm driving by, I see the restaurant is half full and I went, oh, that's kind of interesting. And then a little bit further down, there's a great pizza place called Vito's that has always packed. There were like three cars in the parking lot and I thought to myself, okay, something's going on here.

And I pulled into the element. entry school where the meeting was taking place. I had to park about a third of a mile away. As I made my way in the building, I could not get in the cafeteria where the meeting was being held. There were easily 600 people in this, you know, a small county that it turned out. Shenandoah County had more than a thousand people. Sponsylvania County, I believe, had more than a thousand people. Prince William County in the D.C. suburbs had more than a thousand folks show up. So it really is unlike anything that I've witnessed before. And I think Democrats are getting a little concerned about what this means for their agenda.

Yeah, they absolutely should. So you said there's going to be 80 counties and or municipalities that are going to be part of the sanctuary city. How many counties are there in Virginia? There are 95 counties in Virginia. Wow, man. Wow. Yeah. I think by the time the legislature,

starts up in early January, we'll have at least 80% of the counties in the state will have passed this resolution. And what this resolution says is that it is the intent of the county to not spend any public funds enforcing unconstitutional gun control laws. And that's really what the counties can do. But the really interesting thing is what we're seeing now from county sheriffs and from Commonwealth attorneys who are the local prosecutors in Virginia. And we're seeing more and more of those law enforcement officials step up and say, yeah, I'm not going to enforce a red flag law. I'm not going to enforce taking people's guns away. I'm not going to enforce these laws. We have bigger priorities. The legislature needs to be addressing mental health.

And, you know, these law enforcement officers, they do have the discretion to decide what their priorities are going to be. Well, we see, look, they certainly love around the country when district attorneys and law enforcement officials say, you know what, we're not going to prosecute simple petty theft and we're not going to prosecute people who are living on the streets and we're not going to prosecute just small crimes we love that we're happy about that exactly right that's exactly right and so it's been fascinating to see the pushback in the press here in virginia because you've got people you've got people who are trying to compare gun owners right now to slave owners in the 1830s you know who tried to nullify the tariff in

South Carolina because they wanted to keep a hold of their slaves. And the point that I keep making is, look, this is, by the way, this is very different. If you want to go back to the 1830s, in Virginia, there was a slave revolt called Matt Turner's Rebellion. And as a result of this slavery revolt in which 50 people were killed, Virginia's lawmakers then banned the keeping and bearing of arms by free blacks. So if you want to talk about, you know, a gun control response to a tragedy, yeah, you know, we've got that in the state's history. But what gun owners are doing, we're not trying to inhibit the free exercise of any rights. We're trying to protect the free exercise of constitutionally protected rights.

And the folks who are turning out, I'm telling you, 18 to 80, black, white, men, women, it is a cross-section of this state. And again, I just think that I don't think the gun owners or I don't think Democrats really understand what they have woken up here by, you know, pushing this anti-gun agenda so hard. Okay, so how and previously you said that you believe that is some form or fashion this bill is going to pass

so yeah, I do. If that passes, what happens then? I mean, are people, do you think that some of the county sheriffs actually have the backbone enough to say, hey, we're not going to do it? We're not going to

enforce this? I do. I think particularly in the more rural areas of the state, you're to see that. You know, I don't think you'll see that in the northern Virginia suburbs or the suburbs of Richmond, but absolutely. In a lot of these counties, there will be sheriffs who will say, you know, look, I'm not going to enforce this magazine ban, or I'm not going to go out looking for people who own these banned guns. I think one of the big issues is going to be what happens with these quote-a-court red flag laws. What happens when a judge tells the county sheriff,

hey, go and seize this person's guns because I've determined that there's a substantial risk that they're a danger to themselves or others. Did the county sheriff say, no, get the state police to do it because I'm not? Or did the county sheriff say, all right, I'm going to do this under protest. I can tell you, just in talking with a couple of county sheriffs around the state, this is very much a topic of discussion that they're having among themselves. And I suspect that there is probably going to be a fair, unified front presented by a lot of these county sheriffs, particularly once these bills get introduced

and we can see some of the specific language, I would not be surprised to see the state sheriff's association come out in opposition to a red flag proposal. And they'll talk about exactly why they have their problems with it. But again, I think we're, you know, as to what happens, I think we're kind in uncharted territory right now. I can tell you that I think any bill that gets signed in the law by Governor Northam is going to get challenged in court. I'm, hope to that we're going to see some, you know, temporary injunctions put in place to prevent these laws for actually taking effect. But if these laws go into effect, I mean, that's really the great unknown is what type of

compliance we see, not only from the part of Virginians, but, but, you know, on the part of law enforcement as well. And what happens when people like myself who have lost all their weapons over the years and don't? I wish I knew what happened to them, Cam, but I don't. I just don't know what happened to them. They've disappeared. what happens if I say they've disappeared and then I have to use one.

They've been so, you know, it's funny you bring out because there have been so many boating accidents recently in Virginia involving people who've just taken their guns up for, you know, trips on the James River. And it's awful. I pile up over and they all fell down to the bottom. You know, again, I think it's a great question. And I could definitely, you know, first of all, I suspect what would happen is that, if charges were brought. Let's say you used an unregistered firearm that was supposed to be registered in self-defense. And the local commonwealth attorney decided we're going to charge you,

not for defending your life, but for owning that gun. Right. I think in a lot of counties, frankly, you'd have juries come back and acquit you. I just don't think that, again, you know, it comes down to enforcement and how do you enforce an unpopular law? And that is the conundrum that the state of Virginia is going to be facing here very quickly because a lot of the laws that they pass are going to be very unpopular in most parts of the state. And being unpopular, look, and you brought up a great point between the sheriffs and the state police, right? So the sheriffs answer to the people.

The state police do not. So, I mean, they can state police cannot be happy about it, but they're still pretty much mandated to do it. So somewhere along the line, somebody's coming to your house to take your guns. if the bill passes. Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, you know, I don't want any gun owner in Virginia or around the country to think that a Second Amendment Sanctuary Resolution is a suit of armor for the second amendment.

It's not, right? I mean, this is a defensive measure, and I've been telling everybody, we are in for some really dark days in Virginia. You know, I am cautiously optimistic. I think that we are building a new grassroots movement in the state that can push back. But for the next two years until the 2021 elections, Democrats are going to be able to have their way legislatively. And really our only recourse is going to be with those lawsuits.

And then again, we get into the idea of civil and even civic disobedience. Right. And look, if you're looking at a domino effect as far as these states are concerned, to me, you know, Virginia is the, you know, the bellwether. And if it passes and they start actually doing it, there's going to be a number of other states that are going to believe, like, well you know we could we should do it too and uh that that fight is going to get really big and ugly um and and i would say that um i apologize for this right now but texas is closed and uh

i just i know this i just happen to read it today i was surprised as anyone that texas is closed and we're not you know there's other states that might take you but texas won't we're closed uh we do have west virginia which is uh which is pretty good and pretty close and And there actually have been, you know, some sort of joking ideas about, well, maybe West Virginia could just annex, you know, most of the state. And we could just have the state of Northern Virginia. I've wanted to do that before anyway. Right. Exactly.

But, you know, it's funny that you bring that up because I have talked to a couple of people at these kind of meetings that I've been to. And I said, you know, have you guys thought about leaving? We thought about moving. Yeah. And everybody that I've talked to and I asked that question, they all say no. No, they don't want to move. I thought we chose to live here. This is America.

Yep. And you really can't run away. I mean, you just, you can't. You do have to stand and fight because this fight is coming to you no matter where you live. This fight's coming to Texas. I know. Right. I mean, they're going to try to turn Texas blue in 2020.

They're all, I mean, they're already trying that. Right. And it's easy to roll our eyes and say, oh, it's not going to happen. Well, again, 26 years that Republicans controlled the state legislature in Virginia until all of a sudden they didn't. Right. And look, We see stories all the time of, and just aside from Virginia, but we see stories all the time about all the people moving to Texas

and moving to other states. And some other states, you know, are those states because they're, you know, in quotation marks, freer. I got news for you. They won't be soon. Not if we love this to continue on. That's for sure. Yeah.

So when is their big vote for this that this battle is supposed to happen? Well, the session gets underway, I believe, January 20th. and lawmakers have said the gun control is going to be their first priority. So I would expect, you know, we'll start to see this stuff start moving in late January, early February. Well, I sure hope nothing bad happens in between that. And I mean that seriously. I never want anything bad to happen. But, I mean, if something really bad were to happen that might help push that over the edge,

and then now you're getting really into territory I don't even want to think about. Yeah, I'm right there with you. It's just horrible. So you still believe it passes. I do. You know, there's a 21 to 19 Democrat over Republican majority of the state Senate. They've got a wider margin in the House of Delegates. So if it's close, it's going to be close to the state Senate.

I just happen to think that Democrats are going to twist enough arms, you know, for those rural lawmakers and they'll say look you've got four years before you're up for re-election again the voters will forget about this uh you got to stick with us or else you know you're you're not going to be a part of the party anymore they're they're number one priority they will do what they need to do to get a pass but if you look out at the lawn at the state house and gun owners are out there with their guns how do you vote for that and i'm not i'm not saying that people should up with their guns, although they should. They will. Just me, they will. It's legal and allowed in Virginia, so they'll be there on

January 20, and that's when our gun lobby day is going to be, and I expect that there will be thousands of folks in attendance there. I'm actually going to be speaking at a rally on January 20 to have the state capital. And, you know, as to how they do it, I don't know, I guess they close their eyes, they ignore the folks outside, they think about the scads of Bloomberg bucks that are headed their way in their re-election campaign if they vote for gun control right now because they know that they'll have the backing of the anti-gun billionaire who has already spent millions of dollars in Virginia to turn the state blue. And I think that ultimately that's what it's going to come down to.

They will have to ignore the will of their constituents in order to do this, but that's exactly what I think will do. The will of their constituents. And never mind that pesky thing, the Constitution. and never mind that thing. What is that? Dust that, that's outdated, right? It's in person. He can't even read it anymore. Thank you. Just amazing.

So, Cam, one of the other things I wanted to talk to you about it, and we'll talk more about this, and I certainly hope that you're wrong, and that it doesn't pass. And the only problem with that is, is that even if you're wrong, it's going, you know, it's started, you're right in that it's started a downhill slide that will continue to, you know, it's started a downhill slide that will continue to go downhill no matter what. And people had better start waking up or they'll be coming for your guns, even if you think they,

I could never happen in the U.S. Yeah, yes, it could. But one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about too is that, you know, I give you a hard time about 40 acres and a mule, a fool, I got it. And, you know, and your show, and it's fascinating, and I love the show, and I love the story of your life.

But really, I mean, You are living your American dream. I mean, you're doing it. You decided that you wanted to do farm and have, you know, have cattle and have farming to be a farmer. I have mules. That's it. That's me.

And you did it, right? So what, what made you to do that? What made you decide to do that? You know, and you're right. I'm very, very lucky. Every day I wake up and I appreciate where I am. And, you know, I asked how we decided to do it. So my wife and I lived in Oklahoma.

She lived in New Jersey when we got married. And we lived in Oklahoma City for 70 years. I moved to D.C. in 2004 to start doing Cam and Company for NRA News. And we made it about eight years in the northern Virginia suburbs of D.C. Before we just hated it. We hated the traffic. We hated the cost of living. I could look out, I would open my front door and I could count 28 other houses.

And at some point you just feel like everybody is just living on top of you. And it was kind of impacted our marriage too at the time. We were not in a good place. And so one night we were talking. And at the time, my show was 9 to midnight. So I rarely saw my wife and kids during the week anyway. Boy, that sucks, huh? Military. Right?

You know that in the radio days. I mean, you never, it's so rare to have a normal schedule. No. We had a lot of friends who were in the military and who were doing, you know, 12 and 14 months deployments overseas. And so we saw the sacrifices that other folks were making. And I just said, well, why don't we just, you know, why don't we just look and see if we can find a place that we want to live in? And, you know, worst case scenario, I can, you know, live in B. Cedar in the week and drive home on the weekends.

And we just decided, let's go look and see what's out there. And when we started driving around Virginia, we started in the Shenandoah Valley. went into West Virginia and Northern North Carolina. Beautiful areas. They are. And we never found like the right house, but we knew that we were on the right track. You know, we knew that this was really something we wanted to try to do. And after about four months of looking, we found this, you know, great rambly old farmhouse

that started out as a log cabin in 1770 something. And it's just sort of been slowly built onto over the years and it's on 40 acres. And as soon as you were driving down the driveway, actually, my wife said, this is it. And she was right. But honey, there's no mules. No mules. There's space, but no mules yet. And we made it work.

And so for a year and a half after we bought our place, I actually rented a 9-by-9-foot bedroom in a townhouse in Alexandria, Virginia. And that's where I stayed, basically, Monday night through Thursday night. And by the way, in that neck of the woods is not that uncommon. I mean, some of your lawmakers do that as well. So, I mean, it's not a non-compet thing to do. No. And so we did it for a year and a half.

And eventually I was able to move the show down to Farmville, Virginia. And I didn't have to, you know, live away from my family during the week. And so for, it's been seven years since we made the move. Wow. It's been, I guess, about five and a half since I lived here full time. And again, I'm just so appreciative of the fact that I can work in politics, I can work in media, and I can do it from a rural location. I don't have to be right there in D.C. And we have been able to make it work. My wife is able to telecommute for her job. You know, there have been times with her health issues where we've kind of wondered what it would be better off if we were in a big city. But the tradeoffs that we would have to make, I just, I think we're being. Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah, it's not worth it. So, you know, I just love the idea that, you know, guess what? This is, and this is, look, this is one of the things that, the argument to Virginia and the Second Amendment and taking your guns away, I mean, you're supposed to be able to live your American dream in this country. That's why people are trying to come here and get in this country. We're not supposed to be taking rights away. We should be giving people more rights. It's a really strange outlook on life. to be wanting to take people's rights away.

It's just, I can't even fathom thinking like that, but they're out there. I'm with you. And I've got to tell you, one of the great things about the county that I live in is that, you know, my American dream is not necessarily my neighbor's American dream. Right. Right. You know, and so I live in a place. I live in a rural county.

It's called Buckingham County at 18,000 people. We have a commune that's been here since the 60s called Yogaville. That has about 200 full-time residents. we have an influx of Amish farmers that are moving in from the Lancaster, Pennsylvania area, because our land is cheaper than it is up there. Wow. We've got, right? And so, you know, our county is almost 50-50, black and white.

It's about 55-45 Republican Democrat. I mean, it shouldn't, we should be at each other's throats, right? Because we're all of these different people. There's a Catholic monastery that's here. And yet we all get along, and we're all neighbors. Amazing. We all get out for each other. Amazing. And I think really one-on-one or as, you know, family-on-family around America, that's pretty much the way we are. I think it gets portrayed wrong in the mainstream media because really everyone wants to get along. I really believe that.

I agree, but I also think that there are people, particularly that sort of new breed of Democrats who really don't want us to get along. And they do want that friction. They want that tension. And there's probably some of those folks on the right as well. But I think we're right. I think for the vast majority of us, we're looking, we're not looking to pick a fight, right? We're looking to be left alone. Thank you.

That's just amazing to me. So how's your wife doing? How's everything with her struggles and your struggles, the family struggle, with your wife's issues? Yeah, she's doing okay right now. She was in a clinical trial. So for those who are new to the program, my wife, Ms. E, is my co-oist on 40 acres in a pool. And for about a little more than three years now,

she's been fighting non-small cell lung cancer. And she was in a clinical trial earlier this year. She had to get off because of some of the side effects. And so she's actually not been on any treatment for the last two or three months. And it's a little concerning. Her doctor says the tours are slow growing. so, you know, don't try to freak out about it. But I'm hopeful that in the next couple of weeks,

she's going to be back on some sort of treatment. I mean, the good news is she feels fine. She feels really good. But the bad news is that there's nothing in there that's, you know, killing those cancer cells right now. So we can change that pretty quickly. Yeah, you're right. That does need to happen.

And I certainly pray that it does. Cam Edwards, 40 acres and a fool. You can subscribe the same place that you subscribe to chewing the fat. amazingly at the Theblaze.com slash podcast. And for right now, and I'm not promising anything past today, but for right now, it's free. So just go to the blaze.com slash podcast

and click on 40 Acres and a Fool and Chewing the Fat, and you could subscribe there on any platform that warms the little inside of your heart. Cam Edwards, thanks a lot, man. I appreciate it. Always a pleasure. Next time we talk, Jeffrey, I'm going to have a mule after you, buddy. It's going to be a mule named Jeffie. I love you for that.

Thank you very much.