April 19, 2026 • 44 mins
Live from the Ruger booth at the 2026 NRA Annual Meetings
-- Ruger re-enters the shotgun market with the iconic Red Label, plus new rifles from a new factory.
-- After getting rid of the rascals, the NRA is back and stronger than ever in the fight for the Second Amendment. John Commerford, head of the ILA, provides updates on the legal and legislative activities.
-- The pistols and revolvers from Taurus are miles ahead of only a few years ago. Caleb Giddings explains what's new, and what's different.
Gun Talk 04.19.2026 Hour 1
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/gun-talk--6185159/support.
-- Ruger re-enters the shotgun market with the iconic Red Label, plus new rifles from a new factory.
-- After getting rid of the rascals, the NRA is back and stronger than ever in the fight for the Second Amendment. John Commerford, head of the ILA, provides updates on the legal and legislative activities.
-- The pistols and revolvers from Taurus are miles ahead of only a few years ago. Caleb Giddings explains what's new, and what's different.
Gun Talk 04.19.2026 Hour 1
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/gun-talk--6185159/support.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Ruger Light RAG Security three eighty is easy to
shoot and easy to wreck, small enough to carry concealed
or in a purse, big enough to absorb recoil. Learn
more at Ruger dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Upgrade your optic with Hollisen, where innovation meets precision. With
fifty thousand hours of battery life, shake awake technology and
a solar failsafe, your optic is always ready when you
are Hollosen confidence in every shot.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
He was the first and he's still the best. For
thirty years, Tom Gresham has been your trusted source on
all things ballistic, new guns, Second Amendment, personal protection, deep
part of it. Paul, Tom Talk Gun Now, here's Tom
(00:49):
no more.
Speaker 4 (00:49):
You better buckle up because we got a lot to
talk about today. I am Tom Gresham. I am your
host is gun Talk, and we are live from Houston, Texas.
We're at the NRA's annual Meetings we call the Nation
in Houston Annual Meetings twenty twenty six, where we have,
of course a lot of things going on with the NRA.
We'll talk about that as well, but also we're in
the middle of a huge exhibit hall. It's kind of
(01:09):
a kind of a miniature Shot Show. The big difference
is you can go to it. At the Shot Show,
you have to be a part of the industry. Here
it's open to the public, and we've have tons of
people going through this and looking at all the cool
guns and accessories and Ammo and everything else, and a
lot of families, a lot of young kids.
Speaker 5 (01:25):
It's great to see it's now.
Speaker 4 (01:27):
The one thing I will tell you is that we're
going to have a whole stream of guest here and
we're really not set up to take a calls today,
so just kind of a heads up, so just sit
back and listen and enjoy. Now you're free to keep
asking questions of me. I just won't hear them, but
maybe if the telepathy thing works and maybe I'll pick
that up from you.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
So there you go. If you would like.
Speaker 4 (01:47):
You can also check out all the gun talk things
we've been shooting content some videos. We have hundreds and
hundreds of little short videos we've been shooting here. We'll
start uploading those shortly. They'll be out. Also able to
grab a couple of really important interviews I'll tell you about.
But let me just tell you right now. I chatted
with Harmy Dillon the Assistant US Attorney General in charge
(02:09):
of the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice
and the Second Amendments Section. And also then right after that, unbelievably,
we've got Todd blanche He is the acting Attorney General,
replacing Pam Bondy, who got him in here. And I'll
just give you a little heads up on that. He's
part of the gun industry.
Speaker 5 (02:27):
I did not know.
Speaker 4 (02:28):
His family makes fire magazines and has for forty years.
So the new Acting Attorney General of the United States
of America is part of the gun business. Crazy did
not know that. All right, We're actually in the rugerbooth.
Our good friends at Ruger letting us hang out here
in broadcast here. So we're definitely gonna have some folks
from Ruger in here and maybe some news, but certainly
(02:50):
some things that you may have wondered about we'll be
talking about right now. We've got Rgie Stitt Joints as
he's the senior director of product Strategy.
Speaker 5 (02:58):
Aregie. What is projects strategy.
Speaker 6 (03:01):
Product strategy is that it's more than just building something
because you can build it, you need to build the
right things that the people are looking for at the
right time. Give people time to understand what new products
are out there before you pile on top.
Speaker 7 (03:19):
Of it with something else.
Speaker 5 (03:20):
Okay, So it's.
Speaker 6 (03:22):
Basically we're doing life cycle planning of the firearms.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
I've often said that I think that sometimes when you
put out a new product and you're involved in the company,
by the time it actually comes out, you've been working
on it for two, three, four, five years, and just
about the time it's really starting to catch people are
understanding what it is, you're tired of it, and you
move on to the next thing.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
That kind of how it happens.
Speaker 7 (03:47):
Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 6 (03:50):
You know, we've we built American pistols for a few
years and the guns themselves were great, right, but they
didn't sell very well, and we moved on to RXm,
you know.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Right, which is, by the way, a great pistol. I
think that I think it's a home run, absolutely.
Speaker 6 (04:08):
I mean RXm is a very exciting product, basically a
Gen three glock style.
Speaker 4 (04:15):
Yeah, but we worked with a chassis with a better
grip angle too, by the way.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
Yeah, it's got a great it really works.
Speaker 7 (04:21):
They shoot really well.
Speaker 8 (04:23):
You know.
Speaker 6 (04:23):
We partnered with Magpool to develop the frame or using
the Magpool magazines. That's always some of the hardest stuff
on a firearm is coming up with a magazine that works.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
It's so weird. I mean, I bet I've heard that
half a dozen times of various booths here they'll say,
you know, we always start with a magazine.
Speaker 5 (04:40):
What. Well, it must be true because you all say
the same thing.
Speaker 7 (04:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (04:43):
Well, I mean, if you have something that works, stick
with it, right, why would you change from that?
Speaker 5 (04:48):
And it's one of the hardest things to get right correct.
Speaker 6 (04:51):
And then you have something like this that's readily available
in the marketplace that there's you know, dozens of people
that manufactured.
Speaker 5 (04:58):
The millions of these magazines out correct.
Speaker 6 (05:00):
So it gives it gives a consumer that's buying a
new gun a lot of options for aftermarket parts.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
It's not proprietary, so you can use the magpot mags,
you use glock mags, you can use all the glock
clone mags. Like I say, everybody's making them. So there
you go. It's a great pistol. All right, But let's
talk about some of the things have been going on.
You guys bought a gun company for basically for the
manufacturing Facility's talk about that.
Speaker 7 (05:27):
So We're very excited about it. The the eighty odd.
Speaker 6 (05:31):
Employees that we were able to retain from the previous.
Speaker 5 (05:35):
Owner, Anderson and Manufacturing, which made really good rs.
Speaker 7 (05:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (05:40):
Well, you know, it's interesting. We went in there, we
spend a lot of time. The facility is absolutely beautiful.
The uh it's state of the art. It's a very
convenient location as it's sitting right at the end of
the runway at the Cincinnati Airport, right very gun friendly
Kentucky area.
Speaker 7 (06:00):
Yeh.
Speaker 6 (06:01):
But the guns themselves were not quite up to our standard.
Speaker 5 (06:05):
Were not where you wanted them to be correct.
Speaker 6 (06:07):
So we we bought the facility in July and we
didn't build the first gun until October. And now we
we spent all that time measuring and studying and updating
the processes to build the guns to our standards. So
the gun that you're buying today, we have two models.
(06:28):
One has some basic basic furniture on it and the
others have the upgraded magpool. They have two different handguards.
The one has the full twelve o'clock rail and the
other one is just a half rail, so it's a
little bit lighter. Depends on what you want. Two guns.
Both the cops six, both of them called the Harrier. Yep,
that's we rebranded. So we had the AR five five
(06:52):
six's for a decade that we built in our North
Carolina facility, and we've elected to shut that down completely
and build all of our modern sporting rifles in Hebron, Kentucky.
Speaker 5 (07:05):
Okay, what about the s F A R.
Speaker 7 (07:07):
S F A R is out of production right at
the moment, right, but that is uh.
Speaker 5 (07:16):
Everything right now.
Speaker 6 (07:17):
That is our number one priority for before the end
of the year to have s F A R back online.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
All right, are you going to make that Hebron. It's
going to be in Hebrew as well, Hembur.
Speaker 4 (07:27):
Yeah, okay, the new plant there, yep, yeah, okay, because
I mean, I know there are a lot of people
are saying, Man, I like that rifle.
Speaker 5 (07:33):
I can't believe it's not here right now.
Speaker 7 (07:34):
I want to go back now. I bought one myself.
Speaker 5 (07:36):
Yeah it was a nice rifle.
Speaker 6 (07:39):
Yeah, it's a super super cool gun. You know, you
get that small frame, you know, instead of a.
Speaker 4 (07:46):
Big heavy three you get a three eight AR in
an AR fifteen small frame, right. I mean, I don't
know how you did it, but if you did it.
Speaker 8 (07:53):
It worked.
Speaker 7 (07:54):
That works, and the and the guns work.
Speaker 6 (07:55):
You know, it's a but we're trying to We're going
to have an updated, even better product when ever it
comes back fit.
Speaker 9 (08:02):
We'll wait a little bit, save a little money.
Speaker 4 (08:04):
There you go, all right, one of I mean, obviously,
the Ruber American Gin two is a runaway hit you
can't make enough of. And now you got, thankfully from me,
because I shoot off the left side. You got left
handed versions too.
Speaker 7 (08:16):
We just launched some lefties.
Speaker 6 (08:19):
This is part of the change of why we shut
down the AR five five six in our North Carolina facility,
because we're taking that machinery to increase production of Gen.
Speaker 7 (08:30):
Two American rifles.
Speaker 5 (08:31):
So way behind on them.
Speaker 7 (08:33):
We're way behind, way behind. And all that.
Speaker 5 (08:35):
Means is that the demand is demand is great.
Speaker 6 (08:39):
I think there's a little it's hard to figure out
what the secret sauce is, but I think one of
the things that we've done there and what we've done
with the lefty is we've picked some We've followed some
niche calibers and stuff and anything that Horned Day comes
out with twenty two are six are you know? Three
(08:59):
three eight Dark Lake. We're building an American rifles. And
the following has been amazing. And that's why in the lefties,
we don't have a three eight today. Right, we're doing
three hundred blackout, we're doing five five six, we're doing
twenty two arc, we're doing we're doing stuff that's different
things in the marketplace.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
Well, you're doing things that are selling. That's what people
want and right, and the other thing is for people
to understand. I mean, and I talk about this, it's
hard to convince people that your street price five hundred
dollars rifle is like target great accurate, it's just crazy
out of the box. How well they shoot?
Speaker 7 (09:33):
Oh well, we hammer forge all the barrels in the house.
Speaker 6 (09:36):
I mean, you start with a great barrel and you're
you know, you put a chamber in the middle and
you're good to go.
Speaker 9 (09:42):
All right.
Speaker 4 (09:42):
I want to talk about the thing that I didn't
think was ever going to come back.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
You brought back the red label.
Speaker 4 (09:47):
We did we did overt under shotgun, which once it
been twenty five years, it's got to be twenty five years.
Speaker 7 (09:55):
It's been quite a while.
Speaker 9 (09:57):
I don't know that's that long, but it's it's been
a while.
Speaker 5 (09:59):
It feels like because it was a great over and
under shotgun.
Speaker 6 (10:02):
Yeah, it's like everything else. Like I'm saying about the
product strategy. We built that third generate well second generation
Red label with the concept of hitting a price point
and being slightly under the other major manufacturers, and we
couldn't hit that price point.
Speaker 7 (10:22):
Like it just wasn't It wasn't there.
Speaker 4 (10:24):
The gunners are more involved, it's not just cranking out
machine right.
Speaker 6 (10:30):
So this time around we have worked with Connecticut shotgun
Tony Gallazan.
Speaker 5 (10:34):
Over there, and they know how to make shotguns.
Speaker 6 (10:36):
They know how to make shotguns, so you know, this
is probably the nice He's amazing.
Speaker 7 (10:45):
I love him.
Speaker 5 (10:46):
Yeah, it's like that's a crazy genius guy.
Speaker 6 (10:49):
Yeah, I enjoy a visit with Tony. I asked him
if I could invite my closest ten friends to come
and have dinner in his showroom up there, and he's like,
anything you want. I'm like, I don't know if I
can find ten friends.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
Yeah, but people should go take a look at the
website because they do have a picture of the showroom
and it's like, oh, yeah, we could host like a
fabulous place.
Speaker 5 (11:14):
It's unbelievable.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
Yeah, but they have been making really nice, very high
grade you know sibbys and over and unders, but they're
making the red label for you.
Speaker 7 (11:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (11:24):
They've been in business over forty years in Connecticut, so
it's their American made guns. I mean, he's got an
amazing facility. The fit and finish is very very nice,
and it's a very slick little gun.
Speaker 4 (11:41):
Well, Gage, I'm not to put words in your mouth,
but I'm just guessing looking at it, because we're looking
at what thirty two hundred ball park. You decided to
make it, make the quality of what you needed, and
then let the price forward had to.
Speaker 6 (11:53):
Make one hundred percent. That's that is where we're at.
Like this, this gun will compete with anything in that
price category, and it is an extremely nice gun.
Speaker 7 (12:05):
And none of the other ones are made in the
United States.
Speaker 5 (12:07):
Ah, that's the other thing.
Speaker 4 (12:09):
This is a maide in the US gun that And
I know people say, well, thirty two hundred is a
lot of money. I gotta tell you those of us
who say that we just haven't price guns recently, because
if you go out and shop for any kind of
decent over and under, that's not even middle of the pack.
It's like toward the lower end of the pack these days.
Speaker 6 (12:29):
Yeah, if you want something from any of the major manufacturers,
you know there there certainly are people building economical product
and you get what you pay for.
Speaker 8 (12:38):
You know.
Speaker 5 (12:39):
But an American made over and under that's cool.
Speaker 7 (12:41):
Yeah, awesome.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Twenty gage available in twenty eight and thirty inch barrels correct.
And I gotta tell you my personal favorites are thirty.
I just think they balanced better. I bought one, did
you really yep? Yeah, yeah, why would have it?
Speaker 7 (12:52):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (12:53):
Yeah, they're they're that good. And I can't remember do
they have three inch chambers?
Speaker 7 (12:58):
They do? Yep?
Speaker 6 (13:00):
Okay, And I and I believe this is just going
to be the beginning. I mean, I don't know that
we have twelve gauge on our roadmap right at the moment,
but you'll probably see some sub gauges over the next
couple of years, which.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
Very nice.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
Yeah, very nice. I gotta run to the break here.
I appreciate your time you got. You know, we got
a lot of more things to talk about at some point,
but I know there are a lot of things you're
working on.
Speaker 7 (13:23):
We can't talk about it again exactly any time, do you.
Speaker 5 (13:27):
Thanks so much. I appreciate your time.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
All right, we are at the Ruger Booth at the
Arisaniel Medios in Houston.
Speaker 5 (13:33):
I'm Tom Gresha. Be right back with more gun talk.
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Speaker 4 (16:28):
All right, welcome back. I'm Tom Gresham. We are at
the roogabooth at the na's Annual meetings here in Houston, Texas,
having a good time of course. And it is in
fact to the NRA annual meetings where a lot of
things are going on. We had the actual meetings and
we've got the new boards coming in. They'll get sworn
in or accepted I think on Monday. It is a
pleasure right now. Welcome to John Comberford from uh.
Speaker 5 (16:52):
In, Ora Isla.
Speaker 8 (16:53):
Yes, sir, are you sir? Great to see it good.
Speaker 5 (16:55):
So how's the show going for you?
Speaker 8 (16:56):
It's going great, it's going great.
Speaker 14 (16:57):
I was actually running Old Lake getting over here because
everybody's last year. This year, I got stopped a few
more times.
Speaker 4 (17:03):
Everybody grabs you. I want to talk because everybody says,
let me tell you how to run the NA.
Speaker 14 (17:07):
Right, you're not kidding, But that's okay, that's okay because
our members are a part of it.
Speaker 5 (17:13):
Well, they're engaged, that's right.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
One of the I mean, look all the things that
you hear, same things I hear, which people say, what's
going on?
Speaker 5 (17:22):
Is it really back? You know?
Speaker 4 (17:24):
The part of it is. I had a guy cornering
me yesterday. He said, well, you know, I'm still not
back yet. I said, okay, why he said, well, board's
too big, and I'm just you know what it is.
There are people that are still mad at what happened,
and my belief is they don't understand how far the
(17:44):
recovery has come.
Speaker 5 (17:45):
Does that sound fair?
Speaker 14 (17:47):
It's a really good point because there was so much
work to do. It's hard to explain that in single conversations.
But it's been Yeoman's work with our Presidentville Backenberg and
the team of officers, and and of course Doug. I
mean Doug is there. He beats me in and he's
there when I leave, and I can talk about EVP.
Speaker 4 (18:05):
Yeah, I mean, he's he's the guy somebody's pointing out
to me said, look, you do understand that, Like, he
has a good life and he would really probably rather
be playing golf. He doesn't need to do this. It's
just that he is so highly qualified and so committed
and he has the passion for it, and that's why
he's here and doing what he's doing.
Speaker 14 (18:24):
Yeah, he's the right guy at the right time. I mean,
that's that's simply where it is. And he's he's committed,
and it's it's quite a service for our members. Most
people really never understand what type of level of service
he's committing to the association. But he's led us back
out of this rut. And and we're the only way
forward is forward and there's good governance, and our members
really should have confidence in what's happening in Nay.
Speaker 4 (18:47):
And you I'm not going to ask you to say it.
I'll say it and you can correct me if you
think I'm wrong. Basically, we've gotten rid of the rascals,
We've got the right people in his leadership, and now
just within the last two weeks we've elected the right
peace people on the board, and now we have a
good board because people say, basically, why hasn't happened already?
Speaker 5 (19:06):
It takes time. Everything takes a while.
Speaker 14 (19:08):
Yeah, absolutely, And look, we do have a big board.
It's nearly the size of the US Senate in fact.
But and there's a lot of a lot of opinions,
but good opinions, right, you get elected to the board.
And one benefit of seventy six is there's a lot
of there's seventy six people with unique life experience, whether
that's in firearms or business nonprofit governance, and that's a
huge part of it for us. So everyone might have
(19:31):
a different path to get to the end, but we
all have the same goal, which is run the organization
properly on behalf of our millions of members and keep
us here for another one hundred and fifty five years
and execute on the mission and protecting the Second Amendment.
Speaker 4 (19:42):
Okay, well that's the NRA, and then there's n ISLA,
the Institute for Legislative Action, the legal and legislative sided.
Speaker 5 (19:51):
What's going on there.
Speaker 14 (19:52):
So legal, I'm glad you mentioned legal because the fights
have really moved into the courts, really post Bruin Joe Greenley.
In our litigation team, we've become the leader and Second
Amendment litigation. We're involved in more than sixty cases nationwide.
We filed more Meekus briefs than anyone else combined last year.
And he's off to a heck of a start, but
(20:13):
that team and really where I less focused right now,
the Commonwealth of Virginia. Things have changed dramatically, yes, but
we have our court cases ready to go. We're working
with our friends at SAF and FPC on the federal case,
but we're also running a state case there with our
state association, the Virginia Shooting Sports Association. So we have
a good state Supreme Court in Virginia and there's some
(20:36):
good lower level rulings recently. So we're going to take
that fight to Abigail Smaannberg as soon as those bills
become law.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
You said something there I think brought to pick up on.
You're working with SAF, you're working with FPC. There are
people out there who say it's one versus the other.
You guys are fighting, and I keep telling the no.
You'll understand if you go and look at these court cases,
you will see that the NRA and Fire's Policy Coalition
and Secondment Foundation are all working together and share sharing
expenses and getting the work done.
Speaker 14 (21:04):
Look a couple of it wasn't in the far past.
A couple of years ago, you would have had three
lawsuits from and one from NRA, one from GUA, one
from FPC win the message, and now we can file
three or four lawsuits and three or four different locations
because it's a it's a collective effort on the dollars.
It's an individual right, but a collective voice is stronger.
So we're running with that and we're ready to meet
(21:27):
these challenges, whether they're in Maryland, New Jersey, Illinois, or Virginia.
Speaker 5 (21:32):
Right okay, So.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
If you would handicap it for me right now, and
I got thirty secs, we're gonna pick us up on
the back side here.
Speaker 5 (21:39):
How are we doing?
Speaker 14 (21:40):
I think we're okay. I mean, uh, you know, n
Ray in general is okay. Run the way up. We're
taking the fight to places where the fight needs to go.
We're doing really well on the federal level with President
Donald Trump his new attack. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche
was here for two full days on the show floor.
Speaker 5 (21:56):
Yeah at n Joey Walking.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
I did an interview with I'll talk about that in
a minute. Here's the thing that I learned I was
not aware of. Todd Blanche's family is in the fire's business.
Speaker 8 (22:06):
Yes, Checkmate Industries.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
Yes, making magazines for forty years.
Speaker 14 (22:10):
I always said, if anybody has any doubts. The domestic
pressure to keep your mother in law happy is very powerful.
So I think that's a confidence builder if I've ever
seen one.
Speaker 5 (22:18):
I love it. Don't go anywhere where.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
We're at the Ruger Booth that the na's Annual meetings
having the ball over here on Tom Gresham.
Speaker 5 (22:26):
This is guntalk.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
We shall return into the minute back with your Tom
Gresham at the na's Annual Meetings in Houston. Talk with
John Comerford from the na ILA and John we were
just talking. He said, you're getting a big check from
the state of California about a case there, and you're
(22:49):
going to take that and repurpose it if you will,
to go after Virginia. So where's that money coming from?
What case is this?
Speaker 8 (22:54):
It was in the youth advertising case.
Speaker 14 (22:56):
So everybody listening knows there's annoying aged disclaimers to pop
up on the firearm's website. You know, California really kicked
that off, and we suit them and with our partners
at CRPA and a few others, but we're victorious and
they're paying us back attorney fees so much four hundred
and eighty two thousand dollars.
Speaker 5 (23:15):
I love it.
Speaker 14 (23:16):
So that's going to go right to those challenges in Virginia.
So we've got to keep funding. You know, litigation is
very expensive. We're talking about a few other cases that
amount to between two of them multiple millions of dollars
because they've been ten years.
Speaker 4 (23:27):
On the makers so said they're going for a decade
because they keep we can win it, and then it
gets appealed and goes back and forth, and they're using
tax dollars on that side, using our dollars, and then
we have to use our dollars on our side.
Speaker 14 (23:40):
Yeah, they have unlimited dollars because they can go into debt,
they can put bonds out, and all of us have
to manage our own budgets. But the way we win
is by winning in the fall, so we can get
key judicial nominees through the USCENT.
Speaker 4 (23:52):
Well yeah, and I tell people say, look, you can
win court cases, but until you consistently win elections, you
are always fighting a defensive battle. Fair enough, absolutely, all right,
So we got the midterm elections coming up.
Speaker 5 (24:06):
Talk about what's actually at stake here.
Speaker 14 (24:09):
Well, look, Virginia is the best example I have in
current events. We went from a pro gun governor to
an anti freedom governor and Abigail Spamberger and one.
Speaker 5 (24:17):
Election gun confiscator yep.
Speaker 14 (24:19):
And one election, and gunners across the commonwealthare are going
to are facing her raft, but she's going to face
ours at the courts. But take a look at Texas.
There is no scenario where the Nterra is going to
stand by and let someone like James tallerco win a
Senate race.
Speaker 5 (24:32):
He is staying tech twenty six million dollars right now.
Speaker 8 (24:35):
One quarter.
Speaker 14 (24:36):
He raised twenty four to twenty six million dollars in
a quarter. That should send a shot across everyone's bow.
The gun owners are a key part of winning this fall.
Remember President Trump isn't on the ballot, so what does
that mean we go back to a core turnout election.
Gun owners, hunters, they're a huge part of winning.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
What happens if we gun owner Second Amendment Republicans, because
that's really what we're talking about, lose control of the
House and or the Senate.
Speaker 14 (25:04):
What happens mired in impeachment, oversight, hearings on every type
of issue, all of these victories that were winning, all
this good pro gun work that we're seeing in the DOJ,
and what I think the listeners should stay tuned for
for some rules coming out of ATF. All that goes
to the wayside because these agencies are going to be
mired in endless house hearings. And look at the third
(25:26):
Circuit in New Jersey. We had a hardware case heard
in the fall with some of our partners and a
second pro gun or a second pro conservative judge was
seated the day before that case. So the circuit that
oversees New Jersey is now a conservative leaning with a majority.
And that's because of President Trump and the US Senate
confirming that judge in time.
Speaker 5 (25:47):
That's because of elections, Yes, sir, because of winning elections.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
So we have the midterms coming up.
Speaker 5 (25:55):
Obviously people need to vote, but there's more than that.
Speaker 8 (25:58):
Yeah, you got to get out and vote.
Speaker 14 (26:00):
And I know it's a tough topic on the conservative
side sometimes, but early voting is critical. There's a lot
of life that happens between the start of early voting
and election day. You can wake up sick that day,
your dog could be sick, and every vote counts and
you make sure your friends and family are registered to vote,
and if not them into registers.
Speaker 4 (26:19):
Ask you have to ask them are you reagised to vote, well,
I think so, well, let's make sure, let's get it done.
And then when election day comes, let's make sure. Let's
get you there, let's get let's get let's all go
to the polls and vote, and then go out and
have breakfast together. Make it a party, make it a gathering.
But there's more than that. The reality, as we talked about,
(26:41):
the money, money is how things work. And I always
tell people, look open up your guns safe and look
at there and tell me what you would pay to
keep them. That's right, I mean, is it worth a
hundred bucks to you?
Speaker 8 (26:52):
That's right. It should be worth.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
A hundred bucks to you to keep all your guns.
So throw a hundred bucks at your local candidate or
somebody you can support.
Speaker 8 (27:00):
You're exactly right.
Speaker 14 (27:01):
And you know, I just wanted to touch back on
the early voting one more time because I think some
of the listeners don't realize this. If you're tired of
the political ads coming, the annoying text messages, of the
targeted emails, if you vote early, those will stop because
no one is going to waste money on somebody who's
already voted. That's how they have two dollars for the
next voter. If you don't think your vote counts, try
(27:21):
and voting early this year and if the ads stop,
you know they counted your vote, so you know, give it.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
Give it a try. That works for me. I love
it all right. Last thing, where do you want to
tell people? What do they need to know about what's
going on with ISLA?
Speaker 14 (27:34):
And make sure you file us on socials, Facebook, x,
Instagram and go to nrail dot org. Make sure you
sign up for our alerts. We'll kick you over at
Grassroots Alert once a week and we don't fundraise from that,
just to get you the information you need.
Speaker 5 (27:46):
John Comfort, thank you so much. I appreciate you being here.
Speaker 8 (27:48):
Thank you really appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (27:49):
That good deal. We're going to do a hot swap
here in the middle of this show. I'm going to
let you hand that headset over here, because that's what
we're going to do. I mean, we're doing just all
sorts of crazy stuff here. We're in the Ruger booth
at the NA Annual meetings and we're bringing in some
of our buddies here. Caleb Giddings joined us right now
from Turus.
Speaker 9 (28:05):
How you doing, Buddy, Good Good it's been a fun
show so far.
Speaker 5 (28:07):
Yeah, no kidding, Yeah, well, i'd be fine for you.
You've got new cool.
Speaker 9 (28:10):
Stuff we do, we do.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Let's start off with this.
Speaker 4 (28:15):
I keep telling people, and I know you keep telling them,
today's Taurus is not the Taurus of a decade ago.
It's a completely different company with a completely different ethosian culture.
Speaker 15 (28:26):
Absolutely, we have you know, uh, I mean you could
go back to twenty you know, tours in twenty fifteen
and tourists today completely different, right, right. And that's both
here in the States and in Brazil as well. You know,
they changed out a lot of the senior management that
was down there there, brought in new leadership teams, both
in the States, both in Brazil and in Brazil especially.
(28:47):
They've invested a ton of money and time into really
building out this modern machining like Marvel that they've gotten
down there. I've been down to the factory and it
is as modern as any gun company i've been to.
Speaker 5 (29:00):
What does the consumer get out of that?
Speaker 15 (29:02):
The consumer gets increase quality control And the biggest thing
that they get is they get a increase in quality control,
a reliable product. But we're still keeping it at what
you know what people think of that larger that Taurus price. Right,
we have always been an affordable gun.
Speaker 13 (29:17):
You know.
Speaker 15 (29:17):
Last year or two years ago, we launched the g
X two, right, and that was a gun that has
an MSRP of three hundred bucks and it works crazy
and it just runs and runs. So this year we
brought that gun and we added adoptics ready capability to
it MSRP on it's two ninety nine. You're gonna be
able to go to baths pro or wherever and get
it for two hundred fifty bus.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
Let me see how people they may not know you
come to all this from a background of being a
competitive shooter. You're used to shooting pretty much anything you
wanted to shoot.
Speaker 5 (29:46):
Absolutely, so when you and I know you.
Speaker 4 (29:50):
If you thought, okay, this is really not as good
as it needs to be, you wouldn't be sitting here telling.
Speaker 9 (29:55):
Me yeah, absolutely, I mean you just wouldn't.
Speaker 5 (29:57):
I've known you that long.
Speaker 15 (29:59):
No, And the the truth of this is, if Torres
in twenty fifteen had come to me and offered me
this job, I would have said no, thanks, you know,
but Taurus in twenty when I started right here, I
mean here four years now, Wow Tours in twenty twenty
two is a different company, and you know that was
an opportunity for me to get in on a brand
that was really doing cool stuff. And you're really starting
(30:19):
to see the tail the tail of that development in
the products that we're bringing out.
Speaker 9 (30:24):
Right, Like we brought out a roller delayed PDW. You
know I want to talk about.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
Yes because that got my attention big time. Oh yeah,
pd' to.
Speaker 5 (30:33):
I have you a personal defensive weapon, Lit'll be sure,
pistol rifle.
Speaker 15 (30:37):
We believe the technical term is a large format pistol,
so you know it's a So we're bringing it in
as a pistol. We are actually doing all the assembly
on it in the United States. So Mainbridge, Georgia our
headquarters facility. So we get the parts that are made
in Brazil, they get shipped up to us. We build
them all in America, we test fire them in America.
They were actually I was in the factory two weeks
(30:59):
before this show the building them right then and there.
So the gun that I have that I've been using
for my testing was built by an American.
Speaker 4 (31:04):
So all right, people can't see it right now, then
go to the website. But describe what this is.
Speaker 15 (31:08):
So, it's a thirty two round PDW short compact format.
It's got a rail on the back that you can
attach a pistol brace too. It's got attachment points for mlock,
attachment points on the front.
Speaker 9 (31:22):
It's got D points. Yes, nine milimeter, thirty two rounds
stop thirty.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
Rounds okay, nine milimeter a little bit short thing. Great
for home defense. And frankly, I mean, I know people
want to talk about it's like this would be a
great truck gun.
Speaker 15 (31:35):
That's I foresee a lot of these bouncing around in
trucks or on ATVs things like that, because of how
compact it is. Because so to give people a sense
of the size and weight of it, mine that I
have back of the house, I have, I've got a
name point optic on it. I've got a surefire weapon light.
I've got backup iron sights and suppressor. And it weighs
(31:57):
fully loaded five and a half pounds even with k
even with the suppress are on it. Yeah, it's not
a very heavy spread. Does the spresser is not doing
a lot of work.
Speaker 4 (32:04):
But what's helping? Yeah, absolutely amazing. It's great. And tell me,
what do you get out of it? Mean roller block?
Speaker 5 (32:11):
What's that?
Speaker 15 (32:12):
So the whole the nice thing about a roller delay
system is you know everybody who shot like an AR nine, right,
like a nine mil ar, they have felt that recoil
because with that straight blowback system, you've got to have
a big, heavy bolt, and that big heavy bolts a
lot of reciprocate.
Speaker 8 (32:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 15 (32:26):
So I mean that's why when you shoot an AR nine,
you're like, this really doesn't have a lot less recoil
than a five to five six because of that huge bolt.
Speaker 9 (32:34):
That's going back and forth.
Speaker 15 (32:35):
With the roller delayed system, it's a much smaller bolt.
You know, it's the same, it's a very similar operating
system to an MP five K, Right, So that's the
that's the og roll small roller delayed gun.
Speaker 9 (32:49):
And with that at half or a third of the
cause that.
Speaker 15 (32:52):
Yeah, these are gonna these are gonna street price are
gonna be probably around eight eight fifty.
Speaker 9 (32:57):
That is what they're gonna get is what you're gonna
be able to deal.
Speaker 5 (33:00):
You're better be making a lot of.
Speaker 9 (33:02):
We look, we're making them as fast as we can.
Speaker 5 (33:05):
Because you're going to sell so many.
Speaker 9 (33:07):
Yeah, that's what people keep saying. This gun has been.
Speaker 15 (33:10):
You know, I've been able to get out of the
booth and walk around some today and I've been hearing
people talking about it in other people's boots.
Speaker 5 (33:16):
And oh, yeah, yes's not cool.
Speaker 9 (33:18):
I love it.
Speaker 8 (33:18):
I love it. I'm like, we're winning. This is so great.
Speaker 4 (33:21):
Well it's one of those kind of aspirational absolutely, you go,
that's so cool. You know, I know I can't have
an MP five. I can't have one of those, all right,
you know, even the semi auto version. It's just out
of my brain. You can't afford that.
Speaker 5 (33:35):
This is so cool.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
And I think the market the time is right. There's
so many people who now understand what a PDW is
all about, and they go, yeah, that'd be a home
defense gun. They'd be a truck gun mostly what it is,
and say, hey, look, fella, that's what I got here.
Let's go to the range and let you shoot it.
All your buddies shoot it. It's like, you better have
(33:57):
your buddies bring AMMO because they'll shoot a ball your
ammo at the.
Speaker 9 (33:59):
First Sure, mine keeps sneaking into my range bag.
Speaker 15 (34:01):
I was going to like zero revolver for a match,
and I'm like it wasn't not range bag, you know,
don't I go? I got three loaded MAXs forort, go
shoot it a little bit, of course you were.
Speaker 5 (34:11):
Yeah, absolutely, it's a fun guy.
Speaker 9 (34:13):
It really is.
Speaker 15 (34:14):
And I mean from a practicality like you know, uh
not every gun has to be practical, but most guns
can be right and from a practicality standpoint. One of
the things that it is also is it's a gun
that you can hand to a relatively unskilled, untrained person
and say, here's a safety selector, this is fire, this
is safe. If you need to shoot the bad thing,
(34:34):
you put the red dot where you want the bullet
to go out, and press the trigger. Because they're not
going to be dealing with a lot of recoil. They're
not going to be dealing with a lot of muzzle blast.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
If you've got a pistol, a stock or something on it,
you know, a brace.
Speaker 5 (34:46):
It's easy to shoot.
Speaker 9 (34:47):
It's it is easy.
Speaker 5 (34:48):
It's easy to shoot.
Speaker 15 (34:48):
It turns a if you've got a shooter who their
most comfortable shooting distance is, you know that seven to
ten yard range that everybody practices at, even if they
say they don't what a what a gun like this
does is it turns them into a twenty five to
fifty yard shooter, like just by giving them the ability
giving them that third point of contact. However, they're utilizing
(35:09):
the brace all of a sudden, a shot that they
could not perform with a handgun, they can with this
gun with ease, with ease, and it's not And the
other advantage too to it being a large format pistol
is you don't have to worry about like some of
the Byzantine regulations around SBRs ah. So you know, like technically,
if I travel to another state with one of my SBRs,
(35:30):
I have to you know, write a mother MAYI letter
to the ATA, right right, they don't have to do
that with this No, that's you can go in a
bag in my car and go wherever I'm going.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (35:38):
What would be the other thing you want people to
know about Turus right now, whether it's product or whatever.
Speaker 9 (35:43):
I think it's culture.
Speaker 15 (35:44):
So I think I think it's culture with Taurus because
while we have done all of these process improvements and
product improvements and all of that, the one thing that
we did that was smart that we've retained was the
culture that Taurus had of not being afraid to try
new stuff. Right, we did the Judge and the Judge
was an enormous hit.
Speaker 9 (36:03):
It's really to this day working at.
Speaker 15 (36:05):
This job, when people come up to me and they
find out I work for a Taurus, they will be like, oh,
I've got a judge and I love it.
Speaker 4 (36:10):
Yeah, it was a category change it with a category itself.
Speaker 15 (36:15):
Actually so, and you know, and sometimes we've tried stuff
that didn't work, like with the curve, right, but we've
never been afraid to try stuff and we've held on
to that culture because and you can see it in
the PDW. No one expected Taurus to do a PDW.
No one expected us to do a bolt gun, and
it's a really good bolt gun.
Speaker 5 (36:31):
Okay.
Speaker 15 (36:32):
So you know, we have that that culture of being
unafraid to try new stuff and to get into new
segments and new categories. But instead of just now throwing
spaghetti at the wall, there is structure and discipline behind it.
So when we try something new, you get something like
the RPC which just runs and runs and runs.
Speaker 5 (36:52):
Which all that comes out of having the right leadership.
Speaker 15 (36:55):
Absolutely, yeah, no, absolutely, and we have We're very fortunate,
we have great leadership and Brazil and great leadership here
in the States.
Speaker 4 (37:02):
Yeah, terrific stuff. Well, I mean, it's exciting what's going
on there. And I just I guess that I would
circle all the way back to where we came in.
Is this is not the tourist that you think you knew.
If you haven't checked out the tourist guns in the
last two to four years, you owe it to yourself
to go take a look. I mean, and I miss
guilt as everybody. I go, really, and then you pick
it up and you go, well, this is not what
I thought it was gonna be. Over and over again.
(37:23):
This is not what I thought it was gonna be, right,
mm hmm. It's like, okay, cool, So one of those
just give it a chance. Yeah, absolutely, go check it out.
Handle one, even just handing one in the store. You're
gonna go, ah, this is really nice. And then they're
gonna say how much is this again?
Speaker 9 (37:42):
Mm hmm?
Speaker 15 (37:43):
Right, you know, And then that's kind of the thing
like when we did the g X two, which replaced
our long standing you know, G two C sales leader.
The whole point of the g X two was I
firmly believe that your budget should not dictate your ability
to exercise your constitution rights.
Speaker 5 (38:00):
Thank you.
Speaker 15 (38:01):
Right, And if you only have two hundred and fifty
dollars in your pocket, you also deserve to have a
handgun that works.
Speaker 5 (38:06):
Should have a good handgun that can save your life.
Speaker 15 (38:08):
Absolutely, So that was who we built the GX two for.
Is Hey, I need a gun to protect myself, protect
my family. I don't have a lot of money. Cool,
I got a gun for you.
Speaker 5 (38:17):
Yeah, exactly here it is.
Speaker 4 (38:19):
And not only is it just a gun that works,
it's a gun that actually works really well and you
can shoot it well.
Speaker 9 (38:24):
You can.
Speaker 15 (38:25):
Absolutely We tested the heck out of those guns and
they are really phenomenal shooters. Website tours USA dot com
and if you guys want to get accessories, spare mags
Holsters shop touris dot com.
Speaker 4 (38:35):
Shop tours dot common so you get all the stuff
that Holsters accessories, magazines.
Speaker 9 (38:39):
Absolutely all the rest that you buy it direct. Yepah,
have set your house.
Speaker 15 (38:42):
And for all the people out there with t X
twenty two's, we have twenty two round TX two X
twenty two magazines on sale right sale.
Speaker 4 (38:49):
Yeah, outstanding calem gettings. Thank It's always a pleasure, my.
Speaker 5 (38:53):
Friend, thanks Tom, I appreciate it. Yeah, we're just about
the end of the show. I hope it worked out
well for you.
Speaker 9 (38:57):
Do the perfect timing.
Speaker 5 (38:59):
Very good.
Speaker 7 (38:59):
All right, thanks so thank you, John.
Speaker 5 (39:01):
Take care.
Speaker 7 (39:02):
All right.
Speaker 4 (39:02):
We're having fun here in the Ruger booth at the
Intera Antual Meetings. I'll be coming back in just a
minute to give you a little bit of the information
about my conversation with har Meat Dylan and Todd Blanche
of the.
Speaker 5 (39:13):
Department of Justice.
Speaker 4 (39:14):
Yeah, the US Justice Department here at the na show Man.
I was, hey, better than this. I was having any
more fun, I'd be twins. I'm having so much fun
around here. I get to hang out with my friends.
It's kind of like a home week or summer camp
(39:36):
or something. To go to the NRA show and see
people I've known for twenty thirty forty plus years. It's great.
And some of those people got older. I know I didn't,
but I don't know what the he goes with them.
But I got to tell you what happened. Was it yesterday?
No day before yesterday? On Friday, I think it was,
we had har Meat Dylan. I saw in the news
(40:00):
she was going to be at the show.
Speaker 5 (40:01):
I said, well, that's cool.
Speaker 4 (40:02):
We had interviewed her at chat show, and so I
sent a note to her people and said, hey, itch
chance we could get I mean, come on, she's the
Assistant US Attorney General in charge of the Civil Rights Division.
Speaker 5 (40:14):
Any chance we could do an interview with her?
Speaker 4 (40:17):
And I think because she had done the interview with
us before and she felt comfortable with it, they said, yeah,
we'll bring her by the booth.
Speaker 5 (40:23):
So yeah, we did that.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
So Harmy Dillon came by, We interviewed her on video
and we'll have that out in a few days. And
then right after that we were approached by the people
from Todd Blanche's office. He is the acting US attorney
took Pam Bondi's slot. Whether or not he ends up
with it permanently, I don't know. But we did an
interview with him and it was fascinating. Both of them
(40:45):
were great. You're going to love him. One of the
big takeaways I got one is that Harmy Dillon is
an absolute terror. You would not want to cross her.
When she gave me her challenge coin, I've never seen
a challenge coin from some in the US government, and
the middle of it, it says FAFO, Really okay, she
(41:07):
means it man, and she is going to go after
Virginia and Abigail Spamberger as soon as they not only
signed the law, but she says, she explained, Look, it's
got to actually go into effect before we cansue, not
just after it signed. It's got to go because they
may sign and say it goes into effect in twenty
days or one hundred and eighty days or whatever, but
after it goes into the fact they can sue. But
(41:28):
then my conversation with Todd Blanche was fascinating, and he
is the acting US Attorney General. Well, first of all,
turns out his mother in law owns a company that's
exhibiting here, Checkmate Magazines. He's he's in his family's in
the gun business, has been for forty years. So when okay,
this is a good thing. And then he said, look,
(41:49):
he said, I can just tell you that next week
as I'm talking to you right now, the coming week.
Sometime next week, he says, we're going to drop a
whole bunch of new regulations. We're going to drop some announcements,
We're going to change a bunch of regulations. He says,
ATF is no longer going to be going after gun
dealers for misplaced commas or transposed numbers or the zero
(42:10):
tolerance policy. He says, we're going to be going after
criminals like we should be. He said, we're not doing
that stuff anymore. So, Holy cow, I mean, it was
like this. He says, there's a bunch of stuff coming
and he says, of course we're going to get sued
over it. He says, but we're going to win. I mean, look,
he's the head of the Department's Justice. They got lawyers.
He said, yeah, we're going to get sued and it's
(42:30):
going to be a fight. And all this goes back
to and I've said this before, and it irritates some
people for some reason, because some people really like the
bad mouth Trump.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
Even on our side.
Speaker 4 (42:41):
They said, well, he didn't do this. He didn't do that,
Pan Bomby did BONDI didn't do that. I know, I
get it. It takes a while. That was both of them,
both the harmy Dillon and Todd Blant spoke said, look,
this stuff takes a while. We're moving really fast, but
you know, just do it all overnight. Put all that
(43:02):
to say, I personally think this is the most pro
Second Amendment administration we've ever had, probably in the history
of the country. Honestly, I don't think there's ever been
anything like this. I'm not saying that Donald Trump is
super pro gun. I think he's pretty pro gun, but
he's put in the right people and they are just
(43:23):
charging ahead hard. So anyway, we'll look for this next week,
look for the announcements coming out of the Department of Justice,
see what they're going to do. I don't know what
it is, but it sounds like it's going to be big.
So we'll see what transpires there. But I am encouraged
and I am hopeful, and I think we're in a
really really good place. Of course, if we don't win
(43:43):
the midterm elections, all that could get reversed, or at
least they could throw out the anchor and stop the progress.
So we've got to make the commitment to get out
the vote. There you go, Tom Gresham, here we have
the Rugerbee. We'll be right back
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Speaker 3 (00:28):
He was the first and he's still the best. For
thirty years, Tom Gresham has been your trusted source on
all things ballistic, new guns, Second Amendment, personal protection, deep
part of it. Paul, Tom Talk Gun Now, here's Tom
(00:49):
no more.
Speaker 4 (00:49):
You better buckle up because we got a lot to
talk about today. I am Tom Gresham. I am your
host is gun Talk, and we are live from Houston, Texas.
We're at the NRA's annual Meetings we call the Nation
in Houston Annual Meetings twenty twenty six, where we have,
of course a lot of things going on with the NRA.
We'll talk about that as well, but also we're in
the middle of a huge exhibit hall. It's kind of
(01:09):
a kind of a miniature Shot Show. The big difference
is you can go to it. At the Shot Show,
you have to be a part of the industry. Here
it's open to the public, and we've have tons of
people going through this and looking at all the cool
guns and accessories and Ammo and everything else, and a
lot of families, a lot of young kids.
Speaker 5 (01:25):
It's great to see it's now.
Speaker 4 (01:27):
The one thing I will tell you is that we're
going to have a whole stream of guest here and
we're really not set up to take a calls today,
so just kind of a heads up, so just sit
back and listen and enjoy. Now you're free to keep
asking questions of me. I just won't hear them, but
maybe if the telepathy thing works and maybe I'll pick
that up from you.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
So there you go. If you would like.
Speaker 4 (01:47):
You can also check out all the gun talk things
we've been shooting content some videos. We have hundreds and
hundreds of little short videos we've been shooting here. We'll
start uploading those shortly. They'll be out. Also able to
grab a couple of really important interviews I'll tell you about.
But let me just tell you right now. I chatted
with Harmy Dillon the Assistant US Attorney General in charge
(02:09):
of the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice
and the Second Amendments Section. And also then right after that, unbelievably,
we've got Todd blanche He is the acting Attorney General,
replacing Pam Bondy, who got him in here. And I'll
just give you a little heads up on that. He's
part of the gun industry.
Speaker 5 (02:27):
I did not know.
Speaker 4 (02:28):
His family makes fire magazines and has for forty years.
So the new Acting Attorney General of the United States
of America is part of the gun business. Crazy did
not know that. All right, We're actually in the rugerbooth.
Our good friends at Ruger letting us hang out here
in broadcast here. So we're definitely gonna have some folks
from Ruger in here and maybe some news, but certainly
(02:50):
some things that you may have wondered about we'll be
talking about right now. We've got Rgie Stitt Joints as
he's the senior director of product Strategy.
Speaker 5 (02:58):
Aregie. What is projects strategy.
Speaker 6 (03:01):
Product strategy is that it's more than just building something
because you can build it, you need to build the
right things that the people are looking for at the
right time. Give people time to understand what new products
are out there before you pile on top.
Speaker 7 (03:19):
Of it with something else.
Speaker 5 (03:20):
Okay, So it's.
Speaker 6 (03:22):
Basically we're doing life cycle planning of the firearms.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
I've often said that I think that sometimes when you
put out a new product and you're involved in the company,
by the time it actually comes out, you've been working
on it for two, three, four, five years, and just
about the time it's really starting to catch people are
understanding what it is, you're tired of it, and you
move on to the next thing.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
That kind of how it happens.
Speaker 7 (03:47):
Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 6 (03:50):
You know, we've we built American pistols for a few
years and the guns themselves were great, right, but they
didn't sell very well, and we moved on to RXm,
you know.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
Right, which is, by the way, a great pistol. I
think that I think it's a home run, absolutely.
Speaker 6 (04:08):
I mean RXm is a very exciting product, basically a
Gen three glock style.
Speaker 4 (04:15):
Yeah, but we worked with a chassis with a better
grip angle too, by the way.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
Yeah, it's got a great it really works.
Speaker 7 (04:21):
They shoot really well.
Speaker 8 (04:23):
You know.
Speaker 6 (04:23):
We partnered with Magpool to develop the frame or using
the Magpool magazines. That's always some of the hardest stuff
on a firearm is coming up with a magazine that works.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
It's so weird. I mean, I bet I've heard that
half a dozen times of various booths here they'll say,
you know, we always start with a magazine.
Speaker 5 (04:40):
What. Well, it must be true because you all say
the same thing.
Speaker 7 (04:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (04:43):
Well, I mean, if you have something that works, stick
with it, right, why would you change from that?
Speaker 5 (04:48):
And it's one of the hardest things to get right correct.
Speaker 6 (04:51):
And then you have something like this that's readily available
in the marketplace that there's you know, dozens of people
that manufactured.
Speaker 5 (04:58):
The millions of these magazines out correct.
Speaker 6 (05:00):
So it gives it gives a consumer that's buying a
new gun a lot of options for aftermarket parts.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
It's not proprietary, so you can use the magpot mags,
you use glock mags, you can use all the glock
clone mags. Like I say, everybody's making them. So there
you go. It's a great pistol. All right, But let's
talk about some of the things have been going on.
You guys bought a gun company for basically for the
manufacturing Facility's talk about that.
Speaker 7 (05:27):
So We're very excited about it. The the eighty odd.
Speaker 6 (05:31):
Employees that we were able to retain from the previous.
Speaker 5 (05:35):
Owner, Anderson and Manufacturing, which made really good rs.
Speaker 7 (05:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (05:40):
Well, you know, it's interesting. We went in there, we
spend a lot of time. The facility is absolutely beautiful.
The uh it's state of the art. It's a very
convenient location as it's sitting right at the end of
the runway at the Cincinnati Airport, right very gun friendly
Kentucky area.
Speaker 7 (06:00):
Yeh.
Speaker 6 (06:01):
But the guns themselves were not quite up to our standard.
Speaker 5 (06:05):
Were not where you wanted them to be correct.
Speaker 6 (06:07):
So we we bought the facility in July and we
didn't build the first gun until October. And now we
we spent all that time measuring and studying and updating
the processes to build the guns to our standards. So
the gun that you're buying today, we have two models.
(06:28):
One has some basic basic furniture on it and the
others have the upgraded magpool. They have two different handguards.
The one has the full twelve o'clock rail and the
other one is just a half rail, so it's a
little bit lighter. Depends on what you want. Two guns.
Both the cops six, both of them called the Harrier. Yep,
that's we rebranded. So we had the AR five five
(06:52):
six's for a decade that we built in our North
Carolina facility, and we've elected to shut that down completely
and build all of our modern sporting rifles in Hebron, Kentucky.
Speaker 5 (07:05):
Okay, what about the s F A R.
Speaker 7 (07:07):
S F A R is out of production right at
the moment, right, but that is uh.
Speaker 5 (07:16):
Everything right now.
Speaker 6 (07:17):
That is our number one priority for before the end
of the year to have s F A R back online.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
All right, are you going to make that Hebron. It's
going to be in Hebrew as well, Hembur.
Speaker 4 (07:27):
Yeah, okay, the new plant there, yep, yeah, okay, because
I mean, I know there are a lot of people
are saying, Man, I like that rifle.
Speaker 5 (07:33):
I can't believe it's not here right now.
Speaker 7 (07:34):
I want to go back now. I bought one myself.
Speaker 5 (07:36):
Yeah it was a nice rifle.
Speaker 6 (07:39):
Yeah, it's a super super cool gun. You know, you
get that small frame, you know, instead of a.
Speaker 4 (07:46):
Big heavy three you get a three eight AR in
an AR fifteen small frame, right. I mean, I don't
know how you did it, but if you did it.
Speaker 8 (07:53):
It worked.
Speaker 7 (07:54):
That works, and the and the guns work.
Speaker 6 (07:55):
You know, it's a but we're trying to We're going
to have an updated, even better product when ever it
comes back fit.
Speaker 9 (08:02):
We'll wait a little bit, save a little money.
Speaker 4 (08:04):
There you go, all right, one of I mean, obviously,
the Ruber American Gin two is a runaway hit you
can't make enough of. And now you got, thankfully from me,
because I shoot off the left side. You got left
handed versions too.
Speaker 7 (08:16):
We just launched some lefties.
Speaker 6 (08:19):
This is part of the change of why we shut
down the AR five five six in our North Carolina facility,
because we're taking that machinery to increase production of Gen.
Speaker 7 (08:30):
Two American rifles.
Speaker 5 (08:31):
So way behind on them.
Speaker 7 (08:33):
We're way behind, way behind. And all that.
Speaker 5 (08:35):
Means is that the demand is demand is great.
Speaker 6 (08:39):
I think there's a little it's hard to figure out
what the secret sauce is, but I think one of
the things that we've done there and what we've done
with the lefty is we've picked some We've followed some
niche calibers and stuff and anything that Horned Day comes
out with twenty two are six are you know? Three
(08:59):
three eight Dark Lake. We're building an American rifles. And
the following has been amazing. And that's why in the lefties,
we don't have a three eight today. Right, we're doing
three hundred blackout, we're doing five five six, we're doing
twenty two arc, we're doing we're doing stuff that's different
things in the marketplace.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
Well, you're doing things that are selling. That's what people
want and right, and the other thing is for people
to understand. I mean, and I talk about this, it's
hard to convince people that your street price five hundred
dollars rifle is like target great accurate, it's just crazy
out of the box. How well they shoot?
Speaker 7 (09:33):
Oh well, we hammer forge all the barrels in the house.
Speaker 6 (09:36):
I mean, you start with a great barrel and you're
you know, you put a chamber in the middle and
you're good to go.
Speaker 9 (09:42):
All right.
Speaker 4 (09:42):
I want to talk about the thing that I didn't
think was ever going to come back.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
You brought back the red label.
Speaker 4 (09:47):
We did we did overt under shotgun, which once it
been twenty five years, it's got to be twenty five years.
Speaker 7 (09:55):
It's been quite a while.
Speaker 9 (09:57):
I don't know that's that long, but it's it's been
a while.
Speaker 5 (09:59):
It feels like because it was a great over and
under shotgun.
Speaker 6 (10:02):
Yeah, it's like everything else. Like I'm saying about the
product strategy. We built that third generate well second generation
Red label with the concept of hitting a price point
and being slightly under the other major manufacturers, and we
couldn't hit that price point.
Speaker 7 (10:22):
Like it just wasn't It wasn't there.
Speaker 4 (10:24):
The gunners are more involved, it's not just cranking out
machine right.
Speaker 6 (10:30):
So this time around we have worked with Connecticut shotgun
Tony Gallazan.
Speaker 5 (10:34):
Over there, and they know how to make shotguns.
Speaker 6 (10:36):
They know how to make shotguns, so you know, this
is probably the nice He's amazing.
Speaker 7 (10:45):
I love him.
Speaker 5 (10:46):
Yeah, it's like that's a crazy genius guy.
Speaker 6 (10:49):
Yeah, I enjoy a visit with Tony. I asked him
if I could invite my closest ten friends to come
and have dinner in his showroom up there, and he's like,
anything you want. I'm like, I don't know if I
can find ten friends.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
Yeah, but people should go take a look at the
website because they do have a picture of the showroom
and it's like, oh, yeah, we could host like a
fabulous place.
Speaker 5 (11:14):
It's unbelievable.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
Yeah, but they have been making really nice, very high
grade you know sibbys and over and unders, but they're
making the red label for you.
Speaker 7 (11:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (11:24):
They've been in business over forty years in Connecticut, so
it's their American made guns. I mean, he's got an
amazing facility. The fit and finish is very very nice,
and it's a very slick little gun.
Speaker 4 (11:41):
Well, Gage, I'm not to put words in your mouth,
but I'm just guessing looking at it, because we're looking
at what thirty two hundred ball park. You decided to
make it, make the quality of what you needed, and
then let the price forward had to.
Speaker 6 (11:53):
Make one hundred percent. That's that is where we're at.
Like this, this gun will compete with anything in that
price category, and it is an extremely nice gun.
Speaker 7 (12:05):
And none of the other ones are made in the
United States.
Speaker 5 (12:07):
Ah, that's the other thing.
Speaker 4 (12:09):
This is a maide in the US gun that And
I know people say, well, thirty two hundred is a
lot of money. I gotta tell you those of us
who say that we just haven't price guns recently, because
if you go out and shop for any kind of
decent over and under, that's not even middle of the pack.
It's like toward the lower end of the pack these days.
Speaker 6 (12:29):
Yeah, if you want something from any of the major manufacturers,
you know there there certainly are people building economical product
and you get what you pay for.
Speaker 8 (12:38):
You know.
Speaker 5 (12:39):
But an American made over and under that's cool.
Speaker 7 (12:41):
Yeah, awesome.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Twenty gage available in twenty eight and thirty inch barrels correct.
And I gotta tell you my personal favorites are thirty.
I just think they balanced better. I bought one, did
you really yep? Yeah, yeah, why would have it?
Speaker 7 (12:52):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (12:53):
Yeah, they're they're that good. And I can't remember do
they have three inch chambers?
Speaker 7 (12:58):
They do? Yep?
Speaker 6 (13:00):
Okay, And I and I believe this is just going
to be the beginning. I mean, I don't know that
we have twelve gauge on our roadmap right at the moment,
but you'll probably see some sub gauges over the next
couple of years, which.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
Very nice.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
Yeah, very nice. I gotta run to the break here.
I appreciate your time you got. You know, we got
a lot of more things to talk about at some point,
but I know there are a lot of things you're
working on.
Speaker 7 (13:23):
We can't talk about it again exactly any time, do you.
Speaker 5 (13:27):
Thanks so much. I appreciate your time.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
All right, we are at the Ruger Booth at the
Arisaniel Medios in Houston.
Speaker 5 (13:33):
I'm Tom Gresha. Be right back with more gun talk.
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Speaker 4 (16:28):
All right, welcome back. I'm Tom Gresham. We are at
the roogabooth at the na's Annual meetings here in Houston, Texas,
having a good time of course. And it is in
fact to the NRA annual meetings where a lot of
things are going on. We had the actual meetings and
we've got the new boards coming in. They'll get sworn
in or accepted I think on Monday. It is a
pleasure right now. Welcome to John Comberford from uh.
Speaker 5 (16:52):
In, Ora Isla.
Speaker 8 (16:53):
Yes, sir, are you sir? Great to see it good.
Speaker 5 (16:55):
So how's the show going for you?
Speaker 8 (16:56):
It's going great, it's going great.
Speaker 14 (16:57):
I was actually running Old Lake getting over here because
everybody's last year. This year, I got stopped a few
more times.
Speaker 4 (17:03):
Everybody grabs you. I want to talk because everybody says,
let me tell you how to run the NA.
Speaker 14 (17:07):
Right, you're not kidding, But that's okay, that's okay because
our members are a part of it.
Speaker 5 (17:13):
Well, they're engaged, that's right.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
One of the I mean, look all the things that
you hear, same things I hear, which people say, what's
going on?
Speaker 5 (17:22):
Is it really back? You know?
Speaker 4 (17:24):
The part of it is. I had a guy cornering
me yesterday. He said, well, you know, I'm still not
back yet. I said, okay, why he said, well, board's
too big, and I'm just you know what it is.
There are people that are still mad at what happened,
and my belief is they don't understand how far the
(17:44):
recovery has come.
Speaker 5 (17:45):
Does that sound fair?
Speaker 14 (17:47):
It's a really good point because there was so much
work to do. It's hard to explain that in single conversations.
But it's been Yeoman's work with our Presidentville Backenberg and
the team of officers, and and of course Doug. I
mean Doug is there. He beats me in and he's
there when I leave, and I can talk about EVP.
Speaker 4 (18:05):
Yeah, I mean, he's he's the guy somebody's pointing out
to me said, look, you do understand that, Like, he
has a good life and he would really probably rather
be playing golf. He doesn't need to do this. It's
just that he is so highly qualified and so committed
and he has the passion for it, and that's why
he's here and doing what he's doing.
Speaker 14 (18:24):
Yeah, he's the right guy at the right time. I mean,
that's that's simply where it is. And he's he's committed,
and it's it's quite a service for our members. Most
people really never understand what type of level of service
he's committing to the association. But he's led us back
out of this rut. And and we're the only way
forward is forward and there's good governance, and our members
really should have confidence in what's happening in Nay.
Speaker 4 (18:47):
And you I'm not going to ask you to say it.
I'll say it and you can correct me if you
think I'm wrong. Basically, we've gotten rid of the rascals,
We've got the right people in his leadership, and now
just within the last two weeks we've elected the right
peace people on the board, and now we have a
good board because people say, basically, why hasn't happened already?
Speaker 5 (19:06):
It takes time. Everything takes a while.
Speaker 14 (19:08):
Yeah, absolutely, And look, we do have a big board.
It's nearly the size of the US Senate in fact.
But and there's a lot of a lot of opinions,
but good opinions, right, you get elected to the board.
And one benefit of seventy six is there's a lot
of there's seventy six people with unique life experience, whether
that's in firearms or business nonprofit governance, and that's a
huge part of it for us. So everyone might have
(19:31):
a different path to get to the end, but we
all have the same goal, which is run the organization
properly on behalf of our millions of members and keep
us here for another one hundred and fifty five years
and execute on the mission and protecting the Second Amendment.
Speaker 4 (19:42):
Okay, well that's the NRA, and then there's n ISLA,
the Institute for Legislative Action, the legal and legislative sided.
Speaker 5 (19:51):
What's going on there.
Speaker 14 (19:52):
So legal, I'm glad you mentioned legal because the fights
have really moved into the courts, really post Bruin Joe Greenley.
In our litigation team, we've become the leader and Second
Amendment litigation. We're involved in more than sixty cases nationwide.
We filed more Meekus briefs than anyone else combined last year.
And he's off to a heck of a start, but
(20:13):
that team and really where I less focused right now,
the Commonwealth of Virginia. Things have changed dramatically, yes, but
we have our court cases ready to go. We're working
with our friends at SAF and FPC on the federal case,
but we're also running a state case there with our
state association, the Virginia Shooting Sports Association. So we have
a good state Supreme Court in Virginia and there's some
(20:36):
good lower level rulings recently. So we're going to take
that fight to Abigail Smaannberg as soon as those bills
become law.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
You said something there I think brought to pick up on.
You're working with SAF, you're working with FPC. There are
people out there who say it's one versus the other.
You guys are fighting, and I keep telling the no.
You'll understand if you go and look at these court cases,
you will see that the NRA and Fire's Policy Coalition
and Secondment Foundation are all working together and share sharing
expenses and getting the work done.
Speaker 14 (21:04):
Look a couple of it wasn't in the far past.
A couple of years ago, you would have had three
lawsuits from and one from NRA, one from GUA, one
from FPC win the message, and now we can file
three or four lawsuits and three or four different locations
because it's a it's a collective effort on the dollars.
It's an individual right, but a collective voice is stronger.
So we're running with that and we're ready to meet
(21:27):
these challenges, whether they're in Maryland, New Jersey, Illinois, or Virginia.
Speaker 5 (21:32):
Right okay, So.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
If you would handicap it for me right now, and
I got thirty secs, we're gonna pick us up on
the back side here.
Speaker 5 (21:39):
How are we doing?
Speaker 14 (21:40):
I think we're okay. I mean, uh, you know, n
Ray in general is okay. Run the way up. We're
taking the fight to places where the fight needs to go.
We're doing really well on the federal level with President
Donald Trump his new attack. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche
was here for two full days on the show floor.
Speaker 5 (21:56):
Yeah at n Joey Walking.
Speaker 4 (21:57):
I did an interview with I'll talk about that in
a minute. Here's the thing that I learned I was
not aware of. Todd Blanche's family is in the fire's business.
Speaker 8 (22:06):
Yes, Checkmate Industries.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
Yes, making magazines for forty years.
Speaker 14 (22:10):
I always said, if anybody has any doubts. The domestic
pressure to keep your mother in law happy is very powerful.
So I think that's a confidence builder if I've ever
seen one.
Speaker 5 (22:18):
I love it. Don't go anywhere where.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
We're at the Ruger Booth that the na's Annual meetings
having the ball over here on Tom Gresham.
Speaker 5 (22:26):
This is guntalk.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
We shall return into the minute back with your Tom
Gresham at the na's Annual Meetings in Houston. Talk with
John Comerford from the na ILA and John we were
just talking. He said, you're getting a big check from
the state of California about a case there, and you're
(22:49):
going to take that and repurpose it if you will,
to go after Virginia. So where's that money coming from?
What case is this?
Speaker 8 (22:54):
It was in the youth advertising case.
Speaker 14 (22:56):
So everybody listening knows there's annoying aged disclaimers to pop
up on the firearm's website. You know, California really kicked
that off, and we suit them and with our partners
at CRPA and a few others, but we're victorious and
they're paying us back attorney fees so much four hundred
and eighty two thousand dollars.
Speaker 5 (23:15):
I love it.
Speaker 14 (23:16):
So that's going to go right to those challenges in Virginia.
So we've got to keep funding. You know, litigation is
very expensive. We're talking about a few other cases that
amount to between two of them multiple millions of dollars
because they've been ten years.
Speaker 4 (23:27):
On the makers so said they're going for a decade
because they keep we can win it, and then it
gets appealed and goes back and forth, and they're using
tax dollars on that side, using our dollars, and then
we have to use our dollars on our side.
Speaker 14 (23:40):
Yeah, they have unlimited dollars because they can go into debt,
they can put bonds out, and all of us have
to manage our own budgets. But the way we win
is by winning in the fall, so we can get
key judicial nominees through the USCENT.
Speaker 4 (23:52):
Well yeah, and I tell people say, look, you can
win court cases, but until you consistently win elections, you
are always fighting a defensive battle. Fair enough, absolutely, all right,
So we got the midterm elections coming up.
Speaker 5 (24:06):
Talk about what's actually at stake here.
Speaker 14 (24:09):
Well, look, Virginia is the best example I have in
current events. We went from a pro gun governor to
an anti freedom governor and Abigail Spamberger and one.
Speaker 5 (24:17):
Election gun confiscator yep.
Speaker 14 (24:19):
And one election, and gunners across the commonwealthare are going
to are facing her raft, but she's going to face
ours at the courts. But take a look at Texas.
There is no scenario where the Nterra is going to
stand by and let someone like James tallerco win a
Senate race.
Speaker 5 (24:32):
He is staying tech twenty six million dollars right now.
Speaker 8 (24:35):
One quarter.
Speaker 14 (24:36):
He raised twenty four to twenty six million dollars in
a quarter. That should send a shot across everyone's bow.
The gun owners are a key part of winning this fall.
Remember President Trump isn't on the ballot, so what does
that mean we go back to a core turnout election.
Gun owners, hunters, they're a huge part of winning.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
What happens if we gun owner Second Amendment Republicans, because
that's really what we're talking about, lose control of the
House and or the Senate.
Speaker 14 (25:04):
What happens mired in impeachment, oversight, hearings on every type
of issue, all of these victories that were winning, all
this good pro gun work that we're seeing in the DOJ,
and what I think the listeners should stay tuned for
for some rules coming out of ATF. All that goes
to the wayside because these agencies are going to be
mired in endless house hearings. And look at the third
(25:26):
Circuit in New Jersey. We had a hardware case heard
in the fall with some of our partners and a
second pro gun or a second pro conservative judge was
seated the day before that case. So the circuit that
oversees New Jersey is now a conservative leaning with a majority.
And that's because of President Trump and the US Senate
confirming that judge in time.
Speaker 5 (25:47):
That's because of elections, Yes, sir, because of winning elections.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
So we have the midterms coming up.
Speaker 5 (25:55):
Obviously people need to vote, but there's more than that.
Speaker 8 (25:58):
Yeah, you got to get out and vote.
Speaker 14 (26:00):
And I know it's a tough topic on the conservative
side sometimes, but early voting is critical. There's a lot
of life that happens between the start of early voting
and election day. You can wake up sick that day,
your dog could be sick, and every vote counts and
you make sure your friends and family are registered to vote,
and if not them into registers.
Speaker 4 (26:19):
Ask you have to ask them are you reagised to vote, well,
I think so, well, let's make sure, let's get it done.
And then when election day comes, let's make sure. Let's
get you there, let's get let's get let's all go
to the polls and vote, and then go out and
have breakfast together. Make it a party, make it a gathering.
But there's more than that. The reality, as we talked about,
(26:41):
the money, money is how things work. And I always
tell people, look open up your guns safe and look
at there and tell me what you would pay to
keep them. That's right, I mean, is it worth a
hundred bucks to you?
Speaker 8 (26:52):
That's right. It should be worth.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
A hundred bucks to you to keep all your guns.
So throw a hundred bucks at your local candidate or
somebody you can support.
Speaker 8 (27:00):
You're exactly right.
Speaker 14 (27:01):
And you know, I just wanted to touch back on
the early voting one more time because I think some
of the listeners don't realize this. If you're tired of
the political ads coming, the annoying text messages, of the
targeted emails, if you vote early, those will stop because
no one is going to waste money on somebody who's
already voted. That's how they have two dollars for the
next voter. If you don't think your vote counts, try
(27:21):
and voting early this year and if the ads stop,
you know they counted your vote, so you know, give it.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
Give it a try. That works for me. I love
it all right. Last thing, where do you want to
tell people? What do they need to know about what's
going on with ISLA?
Speaker 14 (27:34):
And make sure you file us on socials, Facebook, x,
Instagram and go to nrail dot org. Make sure you
sign up for our alerts. We'll kick you over at
Grassroots Alert once a week and we don't fundraise from that,
just to get you the information you need.
Speaker 5 (27:46):
John Comfort, thank you so much. I appreciate you being here.
Speaker 8 (27:48):
Thank you really appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (27:49):
That good deal. We're going to do a hot swap
here in the middle of this show. I'm going to
let you hand that headset over here, because that's what
we're going to do. I mean, we're doing just all
sorts of crazy stuff here. We're in the Ruger booth
at the NA Annual meetings and we're bringing in some
of our buddies here. Caleb Giddings joined us right now
from Turus.
Speaker 9 (28:05):
How you doing, Buddy, Good Good it's been a fun
show so far.
Speaker 5 (28:07):
Yeah, no kidding, Yeah, well, i'd be fine for you.
You've got new cool.
Speaker 9 (28:10):
Stuff we do, we do.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Let's start off with this.
Speaker 4 (28:15):
I keep telling people, and I know you keep telling them,
today's Taurus is not the Taurus of a decade ago.
It's a completely different company with a completely different ethosian culture.
Speaker 15 (28:26):
Absolutely, we have you know, uh, I mean you could
go back to twenty you know, tours in twenty fifteen
and tourists today completely different, right, right. And that's both
here in the States and in Brazil as well. You know,
they changed out a lot of the senior management that
was down there there, brought in new leadership teams, both
in the States, both in Brazil and in Brazil especially.
(28:47):
They've invested a ton of money and time into really
building out this modern machining like Marvel that they've gotten
down there. I've been down to the factory and it
is as modern as any gun company i've been to.
Speaker 5 (29:00):
What does the consumer get out of that?
Speaker 15 (29:02):
The consumer gets increase quality control And the biggest thing
that they get is they get a increase in quality control,
a reliable product. But we're still keeping it at what
you know what people think of that larger that Taurus price. Right,
we have always been an affordable gun.
Speaker 13 (29:17):
You know.
Speaker 15 (29:17):
Last year or two years ago, we launched the g
X two, right, and that was a gun that has
an MSRP of three hundred bucks and it works crazy
and it just runs and runs. So this year we
brought that gun and we added adoptics ready capability to
it MSRP on it's two ninety nine. You're gonna be
able to go to baths pro or wherever and get
it for two hundred fifty bus.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
Let me see how people they may not know you
come to all this from a background of being a
competitive shooter. You're used to shooting pretty much anything you
wanted to shoot.
Speaker 5 (29:46):
Absolutely, so when you and I know you.
Speaker 4 (29:50):
If you thought, okay, this is really not as good
as it needs to be, you wouldn't be sitting here telling.
Speaker 9 (29:55):
Me yeah, absolutely, I mean you just wouldn't.
Speaker 5 (29:57):
I've known you that long.
Speaker 15 (29:59):
No, And the the truth of this is, if Torres
in twenty fifteen had come to me and offered me
this job, I would have said no, thanks, you know,
but Taurus in twenty when I started right here, I
mean here four years now, Wow Tours in twenty twenty
two is a different company, and you know that was
an opportunity for me to get in on a brand
that was really doing cool stuff. And you're really starting
(30:19):
to see the tail the tail of that development in
the products that we're bringing out.
Speaker 9 (30:24):
Right, Like we brought out a roller delayed PDW. You
know I want to talk about.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
Yes because that got my attention big time. Oh yeah,
pd' to.
Speaker 5 (30:33):
I have you a personal defensive weapon, Lit'll be sure,
pistol rifle.
Speaker 15 (30:37):
We believe the technical term is a large format pistol,
so you know it's a So we're bringing it in
as a pistol. We are actually doing all the assembly
on it in the United States. So Mainbridge, Georgia our
headquarters facility. So we get the parts that are made
in Brazil, they get shipped up to us. We build
them all in America, we test fire them in America.
They were actually I was in the factory two weeks
(30:59):
before this show the building them right then and there.
So the gun that I have that I've been using
for my testing was built by an American.
Speaker 4 (31:04):
So all right, people can't see it right now, then
go to the website. But describe what this is.
Speaker 15 (31:08):
So, it's a thirty two round PDW short compact format.
It's got a rail on the back that you can
attach a pistol brace too. It's got attachment points for mlock,
attachment points on the front.
Speaker 9 (31:22):
It's got D points. Yes, nine milimeter, thirty two rounds
stop thirty.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
Rounds okay, nine milimeter a little bit short thing. Great
for home defense. And frankly, I mean, I know people
want to talk about it's like this would be a
great truck gun.
Speaker 15 (31:35):
That's I foresee a lot of these bouncing around in
trucks or on ATVs things like that, because of how
compact it is. Because so to give people a sense
of the size and weight of it, mine that I
have back of the house, I have, I've got a
name point optic on it. I've got a surefire weapon light.
I've got backup iron sights and suppressor. And it weighs
(31:57):
fully loaded five and a half pounds even with k
even with the suppress are on it. Yeah, it's not
a very heavy spread. Does the spresser is not doing
a lot of work.
Speaker 4 (32:04):
But what's helping? Yeah, absolutely amazing. It's great. And tell me,
what do you get out of it? Mean roller block?
Speaker 5 (32:11):
What's that?
Speaker 15 (32:12):
So the whole the nice thing about a roller delay
system is you know everybody who shot like an AR nine, right,
like a nine mil ar, they have felt that recoil
because with that straight blowback system, you've got to have
a big, heavy bolt, and that big heavy bolts a
lot of reciprocate.
Speaker 8 (32:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 15 (32:26):
So I mean that's why when you shoot an AR nine,
you're like, this really doesn't have a lot less recoil
than a five to five six because of that huge bolt.
Speaker 9 (32:34):
That's going back and forth.
Speaker 15 (32:35):
With the roller delayed system, it's a much smaller bolt.
You know, it's the same, it's a very similar operating
system to an MP five K, Right, So that's the
that's the og roll small roller delayed gun.
Speaker 9 (32:49):
And with that at half or a third of the
cause that.
Speaker 15 (32:52):
Yeah, these are gonna these are gonna street price are
gonna be probably around eight eight fifty.
Speaker 9 (32:57):
That is what they're gonna get is what you're gonna
be able to deal.
Speaker 5 (33:00):
You're better be making a lot of.
Speaker 9 (33:02):
We look, we're making them as fast as we can.
Speaker 5 (33:05):
Because you're going to sell so many.
Speaker 9 (33:07):
Yeah, that's what people keep saying. This gun has been.
Speaker 15 (33:10):
You know, I've been able to get out of the
booth and walk around some today and I've been hearing
people talking about it in other people's boots.
Speaker 5 (33:16):
And oh, yeah, yes's not cool.
Speaker 9 (33:18):
I love it.
Speaker 8 (33:18):
I love it. I'm like, we're winning. This is so great.
Speaker 4 (33:21):
Well it's one of those kind of aspirational absolutely, you go,
that's so cool. You know, I know I can't have
an MP five. I can't have one of those, all right,
you know, even the semi auto version. It's just out
of my brain. You can't afford that.
Speaker 5 (33:35):
This is so cool.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
And I think the market the time is right. There's
so many people who now understand what a PDW is
all about, and they go, yeah, that'd be a home
defense gun. They'd be a truck gun mostly what it is,
and say, hey, look, fella, that's what I got here.
Let's go to the range and let you shoot it.
All your buddies shoot it. It's like, you better have
(33:57):
your buddies bring AMMO because they'll shoot a ball your
ammo at the.
Speaker 9 (33:59):
First Sure, mine keeps sneaking into my range bag.
Speaker 15 (34:01):
I was going to like zero revolver for a match,
and I'm like it wasn't not range bag, you know,
don't I go? I got three loaded MAXs forort, go
shoot it a little bit, of course you were.
Speaker 5 (34:11):
Yeah, absolutely, it's a fun guy.
Speaker 9 (34:13):
It really is.
Speaker 15 (34:14):
And I mean from a practicality like you know, uh
not every gun has to be practical, but most guns
can be right and from a practicality standpoint. One of
the things that it is also is it's a gun
that you can hand to a relatively unskilled, untrained person
and say, here's a safety selector, this is fire, this
is safe. If you need to shoot the bad thing,
(34:34):
you put the red dot where you want the bullet
to go out, and press the trigger. Because they're not
going to be dealing with a lot of recoil. They're
not going to be dealing with a lot of muzzle blast.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
If you've got a pistol, a stock or something on it,
you know, a brace.
Speaker 5 (34:46):
It's easy to shoot.
Speaker 9 (34:47):
It's it is easy.
Speaker 5 (34:48):
It's easy to shoot.
Speaker 15 (34:48):
It turns a if you've got a shooter who their
most comfortable shooting distance is, you know that seven to
ten yard range that everybody practices at, even if they
say they don't what a what a gun like this
does is it turns them into a twenty five to
fifty yard shooter, like just by giving them the ability
giving them that third point of contact. However, they're utilizing
(35:09):
the brace all of a sudden, a shot that they
could not perform with a handgun, they can with this
gun with ease, with ease, and it's not And the
other advantage too to it being a large format pistol
is you don't have to worry about like some of
the Byzantine regulations around SBRs ah. So you know, like technically,
if I travel to another state with one of my SBRs,
(35:30):
I have to you know, write a mother MAYI letter
to the ATA, right right, they don't have to do
that with this No, that's you can go in a
bag in my car and go wherever I'm going.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (35:38):
What would be the other thing you want people to
know about Turus right now, whether it's product or whatever.
Speaker 9 (35:43):
I think it's culture.
Speaker 15 (35:44):
So I think I think it's culture with Taurus because
while we have done all of these process improvements and
product improvements and all of that, the one thing that
we did that was smart that we've retained was the
culture that Taurus had of not being afraid to try
new stuff. Right, we did the Judge and the Judge
was an enormous hit.
Speaker 9 (36:03):
It's really to this day working at.
Speaker 15 (36:05):
This job, when people come up to me and they
find out I work for a Taurus, they will be like, oh,
I've got a judge and I love it.
Speaker 4 (36:10):
Yeah, it was a category change it with a category itself.
Speaker 15 (36:15):
Actually so, and you know, and sometimes we've tried stuff
that didn't work, like with the curve, right, but we've
never been afraid to try stuff and we've held on
to that culture because and you can see it in
the PDW. No one expected Taurus to do a PDW.
No one expected us to do a bolt gun, and
it's a really good bolt gun.
Speaker 5 (36:31):
Okay.
Speaker 15 (36:32):
So you know, we have that that culture of being
unafraid to try new stuff and to get into new
segments and new categories. But instead of just now throwing
spaghetti at the wall, there is structure and discipline behind it.
So when we try something new, you get something like
the RPC which just runs and runs and runs.
Speaker 5 (36:52):
Which all that comes out of having the right leadership.
Speaker 15 (36:55):
Absolutely, yeah, no, absolutely, and we have We're very fortunate,
we have great leadership and Brazil and great leadership here
in the States.
Speaker 4 (37:02):
Yeah, terrific stuff. Well, I mean, it's exciting what's going
on there. And I just I guess that I would
circle all the way back to where we came in.
Is this is not the tourist that you think you knew.
If you haven't checked out the tourist guns in the
last two to four years, you owe it to yourself
to go take a look. I mean, and I miss
guilt as everybody. I go, really, and then you pick
it up and you go, well, this is not what
I thought it was gonna be. Over and over again.
(37:23):
This is not what I thought it was gonna be, right,
mm hmm. It's like, okay, cool, So one of those
just give it a chance. Yeah, absolutely, go check it out.
Handle one, even just handing one in the store. You're
gonna go, ah, this is really nice. And then they're
gonna say how much is this again?
Speaker 9 (37:42):
Mm hmm?
Speaker 15 (37:43):
Right, you know, And then that's kind of the thing
like when we did the g X two, which replaced
our long standing you know, G two C sales leader.
The whole point of the g X two was I
firmly believe that your budget should not dictate your ability
to exercise your constitution rights.
Speaker 5 (38:00):
Thank you.
Speaker 15 (38:01):
Right, And if you only have two hundred and fifty
dollars in your pocket, you also deserve to have a
handgun that works.
Speaker 5 (38:06):
Should have a good handgun that can save your life.
Speaker 15 (38:08):
Absolutely, So that was who we built the GX two for.
Is Hey, I need a gun to protect myself, protect
my family. I don't have a lot of money. Cool,
I got a gun for you.
Speaker 5 (38:17):
Yeah, exactly here it is.
Speaker 4 (38:19):
And not only is it just a gun that works,
it's a gun that actually works really well and you
can shoot it well.
Speaker 9 (38:24):
You can.
Speaker 15 (38:25):
Absolutely We tested the heck out of those guns and
they are really phenomenal shooters. Website tours USA dot com
and if you guys want to get accessories, spare mags
Holsters shop touris dot com.
Speaker 4 (38:35):
Shop tours dot common so you get all the stuff
that Holsters accessories, magazines.
Speaker 9 (38:39):
Absolutely all the rest that you buy it direct. Yepah,
have set your house.
Speaker 15 (38:42):
And for all the people out there with t X
twenty two's, we have twenty two round TX two X
twenty two magazines on sale right sale.
Speaker 4 (38:49):
Yeah, outstanding calem gettings. Thank It's always a pleasure, my.
Speaker 5 (38:53):
Friend, thanks Tom, I appreciate it. Yeah, we're just about
the end of the show. I hope it worked out
well for you.
Speaker 9 (38:57):
Do the perfect timing.
Speaker 5 (38:59):
Very good.
Speaker 7 (38:59):
All right, thanks so thank you, John.
Speaker 5 (39:01):
Take care.
Speaker 7 (39:02):
All right.
Speaker 4 (39:02):
We're having fun here in the Ruger booth at the
Intera Antual Meetings. I'll be coming back in just a
minute to give you a little bit of the information
about my conversation with har Meat Dylan and Todd Blanche
of the.
Speaker 5 (39:13):
Department of Justice.
Speaker 4 (39:14):
Yeah, the US Justice Department here at the na show Man.
I was, hey, better than this. I was having any
more fun, I'd be twins. I'm having so much fun
around here. I get to hang out with my friends.
It's kind of like a home week or summer camp
(39:36):
or something. To go to the NRA show and see
people I've known for twenty thirty forty plus years. It's great.
And some of those people got older. I know I didn't,
but I don't know what the he goes with them.
But I got to tell you what happened. Was it yesterday?
No day before yesterday? On Friday, I think it was,
we had har Meat Dylan. I saw in the news
(40:00):
she was going to be at the show.
Speaker 5 (40:01):
I said, well, that's cool.
Speaker 4 (40:02):
We had interviewed her at chat show, and so I
sent a note to her people and said, hey, itch
chance we could get I mean, come on, she's the
Assistant US Attorney General in charge of the Civil Rights Division.
Speaker 5 (40:14):
Any chance we could do an interview with her?
Speaker 4 (40:17):
And I think because she had done the interview with
us before and she felt comfortable with it, they said, yeah,
we'll bring her by the booth.
Speaker 5 (40:23):
So yeah, we did that.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
So Harmy Dillon came by, We interviewed her on video
and we'll have that out in a few days. And
then right after that we were approached by the people
from Todd Blanche's office. He is the acting US attorney
took Pam Bondi's slot. Whether or not he ends up
with it permanently, I don't know. But we did an
interview with him and it was fascinating. Both of them
(40:45):
were great. You're going to love him. One of the
big takeaways I got one is that Harmy Dillon is
an absolute terror. You would not want to cross her.
When she gave me her challenge coin, I've never seen
a challenge coin from some in the US government, and
the middle of it, it says FAFO, Really okay, she
(41:07):
means it man, and she is going to go after
Virginia and Abigail Spamberger as soon as they not only
signed the law, but she says, she explained, Look, it's
got to actually go into effect before we cansue, not
just after it signed. It's got to go because they
may sign and say it goes into effect in twenty
days or one hundred and eighty days or whatever, but
after it goes into the fact they can sue. But
(41:28):
then my conversation with Todd Blanche was fascinating, and he
is the acting US Attorney General. Well, first of all,
turns out his mother in law owns a company that's
exhibiting here, Checkmate Magazines. He's he's in his family's in
the gun business, has been for forty years. So when okay,
this is a good thing. And then he said, look,
(41:49):
he said, I can just tell you that next week
as I'm talking to you right now, the coming week.
Sometime next week, he says, we're going to drop a
whole bunch of new regulations. We're going to drop some announcements,
We're going to change a bunch of regulations. He says,
ATF is no longer going to be going after gun
dealers for misplaced commas or transposed numbers or the zero
(42:10):
tolerance policy. He says, we're going to be going after
criminals like we should be. He said, we're not doing
that stuff anymore. So, Holy cow, I mean, it was
like this. He says, there's a bunch of stuff coming
and he says, of course we're going to get sued
over it. He says, but we're going to win. I mean, look,
he's the head of the Department's Justice. They got lawyers.
He said, yeah, we're going to get sued and it's
(42:30):
going to be a fight. And all this goes back
to and I've said this before, and it irritates some
people for some reason, because some people really like the
bad mouth Trump.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
Even on our side.
Speaker 4 (42:41):
They said, well, he didn't do this. He didn't do that,
Pan Bomby did BONDI didn't do that. I know, I
get it. It takes a while. That was both of them,
both the harmy Dillon and Todd Blant spoke said, look,
this stuff takes a while. We're moving really fast, but
you know, just do it all overnight. Put all that
(43:02):
to say, I personally think this is the most pro
Second Amendment administration we've ever had, probably in the history
of the country. Honestly, I don't think there's ever been
anything like this. I'm not saying that Donald Trump is
super pro gun. I think he's pretty pro gun, but
he's put in the right people and they are just
(43:23):
charging ahead hard. So anyway, we'll look for this next week,
look for the announcements coming out of the Department of Justice,
see what they're going to do. I don't know what
it is, but it sounds like it's going to be big.
So we'll see what transpires there. But I am encouraged
and I am hopeful, and I think we're in a
really really good place. Of course, if we don't win
(43:43):
the midterm elections, all that could get reversed, or at
least they could throw out the anchor and stop the progress.
So we've got to make the commitment to get out
the vote. There you go, Tom Gresham, here we have
the Rugerbee. We'll be right back
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The MeatEater Podcast
Building on the belief that a deeper understanding of the natural world enriches all of our lives, host Steven Rinella brings an in-depth and relevant look at all outdoor topics including hunting, fishing, nature, conservation, and wild foods. Filled with humor, irreverence, and things that will surprise the hell out of you, each episode welcomes a diverse group of guests who add their own expertise to the vast world of the outdoors. Part of The MeatEater Podcast Network.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by Audiochuck Media Company.