The Senate passed a bill Thursday to allow people to carry concealed firearms on University of Alaska campuses.
Bill sponsor Fairbanks Republican Pete Kelly says students would be safer if there were more guns on campus.
Kelly quoted professors from other countries who opposed the measure.
“’Well, if I’d have known this would be the case, I never would have taken this job.’ Or, ‘If this bill is enacted, I’m considering quitting,’” Kelly said. “Now, almost everyone that heard that, good ol’ fashioned Americans – the same thought was going through our, their mind, because I talked to them later, and repeat after me: ‘Don’t let the screen door hit you in the…’ you know the rest of the phrase.”
University leaders asked legislators to amend the bill so the university maintained more of its ability to regulate guns. While Kelly agreed to some amendments, he opposed others.
Anchorage Democratic Senator Berta Gardner opposed the bill. She noted that the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia recognized that firearm restrictions in schools and government buildings were legitimate.
“The University of Alaska is a government building. It’s also a school,” Gardner said. “The Alaska State Capitol is a government building. We ban weapons in this building. Why do we think it’s incumbent upon us to not allow or trust the Board of Regents to regulate their buildings in the same way we regulate our own?”
The vote was 13-5. Majority caucus Senators Click Bishop of Fairbanks, Lyman Hoffman of Bethel, and Gary Stevens of Kodiak joined Juneau Democratic Senator Dennis Egan and Gardner in opposing the bill.
The House Education Committee will hear the bill next.
Andrew Kitchenman is the state government and politics reporter for Alaska Public Media and KTOO in Juneau. Reach him at akitchenman@alaskapublic.org.
