Anti-gun zealots in New Mexico’s Santa Fe are at it again, pushing Senate Bill 261 to balloon gun-free zones around polling places, effectively turning election day into a disarmament mandate for law-abiding voters. The bill doesn’t just tweak boundaries—it super-sizes no-carry buffers from a modest 100 feet to a sprawling 300 feet (or more, depending on the venue), swallowing parking lots, sidewalks, and access routes. This isn’t about safety; it’s a blatant power play to neuter self-defense rights during one of our most sacred civic duties. Proponents cloak it in protecting democracy rhetoric, but let’s call it what it is: a recipe for vulnerability, where criminals—who ignore signs anyway—roam free while concealed carriers holster up blocks away.

Context matters here, and New Mexico’s already a patchwork of Second Amendment battlegrounds. Post-Bruen, states like this should be expanding carry rights, not inventing new carve-outs. Remember Chicago’s infamous 100-foot school gun-free zones that courts struck down as absurd? SB 261 echoes that folly, creating shoot me first funnels around polls ripe for exploitation. Data from the Crime Prevention Research Center shows gun-free zones are crime magnets—responsible for over 90% of mass shootings since 1950. Lawmakers ignoring this while Santa Fe’s violent crime spikes (homicides up 50% in recent years) reeks of hypocrisy. It’s not voter intimidation they’re preventing; it’s armed citizens who deter it.

For the 2A community, this is a red alert: rally now or watch carry rights erode poll by poll, school by school. Contact your reps, flood hearings with testimony, and support groups like the NRA or GOA mobilizing against it. If SB 261 passes, expect lawsuits—Bruen demands shall-issue consistency, not arbitrary no-go zones. New Mexico gun owners, your vote (and your sidearm) depend on stopping this. Stay vigilant; the right to bear arms isn’t up for ballot-box bargaining.