Ohio Republicans Pass Law To Arm Teachers

Against the wishes of law enforcement and teachers across the state, the Republican-controlled state of Ohio has signed legislation into law that will allow teachers and school faculty to carry guns into schools, with just 24 hours worth of training required. This is a disaster waiting to happen, which is why all of the people with common sense in the state have opposed this legislation. Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins explains why this is happening.

Become a member today!

Support us by becoming a monthly patron on Patreon, and help keep progressive media alive!

Find our merchandise at Teespring

Spread the word! LIKE and SHARE this video or leave a comment to help direct attention to the stories that matter. And SUBSCRIBE to stay connected with Ring of Fire's video content!

Support Ring of Fire by subscribing to our YouTube channel

Be sociable! Follow us on:

Follow more of our stories at

Subscribe to our podcast

*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

This past Monday, Ohio's Republican governor Mike DeWine signed a bill into law that will allow schools to allow teachers, principals, other faculty members to be packing heat in the classroom. And good news. You only have to have 24 hours of training in order to be able to do that. And then of course, each subsequent year, you have to go through another eight hours of training. But yeah, just a, you know, long weekend course, and you too, science teacher, math teacher can carry a gun inside your classroom. Now, this measure has been opposed by teachers unions. It's been opposed by all major law enforcement groups in the state, but the Republicans did it anyway because it's gonna result in more guns being sold and more guns being sold means more money for gun manufacturers and the NRA who then funnels the money back to these same Republican politicians.

Arming teachers is not going to do a thing to make our students any safer. In fact, in areas where this has actually already been tried, what it does is it makes the students a lot less safe. There have been reports of armed teachers, leaving guns unlocked in drawers of one of them actually forgetting they had it with them and leaving it in a bathroom in the school. These are all things that have already happened with teachers carrying guns inside of schools. And the reason the law enforcement officials are not happy about this decision. There are a couple police departments, local police departments in Ohio that do like it. But, but the smart ones oppose it because of a situation like this. Suppose you get reports that there is a shooter in a school everybody's hiding no real clear ID on the individual. You can't ID the clothing, the face, the age, the height, any of that, but you've got teachers with guns too.

So police officers walk into a building. They see people shooting here, shooting here and shooting there. Who's the bad guy. How are the cops immediately supposed to know when they're in the middle of a hail of gunfire? The answer is they won't know. They have to make split second decisions, terrible decisions, and the decision is gonna be to open fire as well. So then you have more gunshots and a teacher who may not be able to see clearly down the hallway, just here's more gunshots coming from that direction. So the teacher opens fire down that way, too good guys with guns do not stop bad guys with guns. The amount of times that that has actually happened here in the United States is absolutely minuscule yet. That is what Republicans continue to push us. That is what they want because it sells more guns. And the people who sell the guns, put the money back into the pockets of the Republican politicians. Those

Are the only people who benefit from legislation like this. If this turns out to save lives, I'll eat my words. Absolutely a hundred percent, but we've seen it tried before and it's had no effect other than, of course, offering easier access to guns, to students who may not otherwise have access to it. Which of course is another side of the story that Republicans don't want to talk about. Maybe there is a kid in a classroom that would love to do something horrible, but has no access to firearms anywhere. Suddenly there's one walking around that classroom every day.