Judge Phillip Journey of the 18th Judicial District Court in Kansas told Acosta he does family law in his courtroom, so he knows what's best for children. For those who are terrified, Journey said "we all pray for you — lift you up in prayer, that we want to hope that you get through this without the consequences that we see so often in victims of domestic crime."
"Can they bring an AR-15 in your courtroom?" asked Acosta.
Journey conceded that no one could bring guns into his courtroom, but he said that schools don't allow guns either.
"Well, people don't seem to have much trouble if they want to unleash that kind of destruction to do just that," Acosta shot back. "NRA supporters like yourself keep saying that the answer to all of this is good guys with guns. The 19 good guys with guns failed in Uvalde. The cops were there in the school. There was a resource officer that was apparently MIA and none of that helped."
Journey blamed law enforcement, saying that it's a separate question from those questions today.
"With these mass shootings, it keeps coming back to the AR-15 and similar models," said Acosta. "Why do people need an AR-15 anyway?"
Journey was silent for several beats.
"You know, it's just a semiautomatic rifle," the judge downplayed. "If you want to be prejudiced about the way it looks. I was aware of what happened in the '94 semiautomatic firearms ban and there were rifles of similar function that just didn't look as ugly. They weren't black guns like a Ruger mini 14 and the Ruger mini 14 was appropriate and the other was not."
"I do want to ask you about the assault weapons ban. How is it an 18-year-old can buy an AR-15 style rifle and have 16 rounds of ammo like we saw with him in Uvalde?" Acosta continued.
"Well, he did not have any prior convictions," said the judge. "He didn't have any prior issues that would have kept him from purchasing one. It's my understanding from the news that he purchased it through a firearms dealer, and passed the background check. He didn't have any prior convictions."
"Right, but should an 18-year-old have an ARar-15? What's he going to do with it?" asked Acosta.
"Should an 18-year-old have one in the Army?" asked the judge.
"They have military training in the army. The 18-year-old in Uvalde did not. He turned 18 and he went out and bought an AR-15," Acosta said back. He noted that an 18-year-old can't buy cigarettes, beer or cannabis, implying that if youth aren't ready for alcohol and other substances, are they mentally developed enough to have weapons of war.
Judge Journey said that the only reason people talk about guns after shootings is that politicians don't want to pay for mental health services. He commented that he was in Topeka, Kansas when the famous Menninger Foundation was defunded along with all other mental health facilities in the United States during the early 1980s. Funding mental health assistance is expensive, and no one cares about it. The NRA has yet to begin a campaign that pushes funding for mental health issues. They also fought restrictions on guns for mentally ill people.
Acosta cut in saying that there were plenty of mentally ill people all over the world but the United States is the only one that has mass shootings like this.
"There have been several other mass shootings all over the world," the judge tried to say.
"Not to the level that we have in the United States, come on," Acosta noted.
Journey went on to blame states for having "holes" in their background check systems.
Legal experts take issue with Journey's leadership.
See the full interview below:
NRA board member goes up in flames on national television
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