Dupage Policy Journal

Burr Ridge business owner Margot Henshaw is asking Illinois state Senate Majority Leader Kimberly Lightford to loosen gun regulation after the senator praised the state’s concealed carry law.

Lightford was carjacked on Dec. 21. She said her husband’s concealed carry license saved them as he fired on the attackers after the couple was separated and he gave her cover to run away.

Henshaw said she hopes the situation will make Lightford think again about the state’s concealed carry law.

"We are all so thankful that Sen. Lightford and her husband were physically unharmed during their ordeal!” Henshaw told Chicago City Wire. “We must pray that she has now been granted the insight that other law-abiding citizens have the right to protect themselves against the burgeoning number of brazen criminals emerging in our increasingly lawless society.”

Henshaw’s comments come in the aftermath of a record year of violent crime in Illinois.

“Everyone wonders what it will take to staunch the exploding violent crime statistics....well, it is not defunding the police and making them afraid to fire on a suspect for fear of legal reprisals. We have tried that and it is having the opposite effect,” Henshaw said.    

Violent crime has emanated from the Cook County area, where prosecution standards have been blamed for rampant criminality.  

“Violent criminals understand violent consequences- when the sitting ducks (that would be the good guys like the senator's husband) can even the odds by packing heat, the bad guys will think twice before striking,” Henshaw said. “And maybe they will decide to pursue something gentler, like maybe burglary, which (even before last summer) had an apprehension - conviction - imprisonment rate of 1%. What legal business can you name that has a 99% success rate with no tax liability, no payroll and no capital outlay?”

Henshaw and other conservatives have called for the state’s concealed carry license requirement to be removed entirely, allowing for all law-abiding citizens to cancel carry.

“Of course we should have no concealed carry licenses so that all can carry without permit. Then law-abiding citizens would be operating under the same rules that the malefactors are observing,” Henshaw said. “If Sen. Lightford does not make this her personal priority when she returns to session after her near-death experience, this will be further proof that our state officials regard themselves as a protected and elite class. Citizens are endangered when they wait months to receive a FOID card;  the Second Amendment guarantees Americans of this right, but not in Illinois.”

Henshaw said it is time for Lightford and others to step up.

“Constituents in the tax hell known as Illinois, sentenced to confiscatory property taxes, avaricious public sector unions and grifting public officials, are rapidly devolving into a vortex of instability under the aegis of Kim Foxx, Lori Lightfoot and their arrogant adherents. We are about to find out if Sen. Lightford is a leader or just  another member of the pack ushering Illinois into the abyss,” Henshaw said.