Fact Check: Sonia Chang-Díaz on Public Safety

FACT CHECK: Sonia Chang-Díaz’s Position on
Public Safety

Senator Wilkerson and/or her supporters have made false and misleading statements about Sonia’s position about public safety concerns in a recent interview on WBUR (Radio Boston). In addition, individual voters are reporting on the doors and during a call in on the WBUR program that they “have been told” things about Sonia’s position on these issues, including gun control and mandatory minimum sentencing, that are patently false.

This fact check is meant to set the record straight about Chang-Díaz’s position on these important public safety concerns.

Claims Include:

At pre-primary Ward debates and more recently in her WBUR interview, Senator Wilkerson has criticized Sonia’s stance on gun control:

• “Limiting the purchase of guns by lawful gun owners to one a month – aside from the fact that they could buy twelve in a year and I don’t know what a lawful gun owner would want with twelve guns a year – it has absolutely nothing to do with reducing gun violence.” WBUR – October 24, 2008

• A call-in voter also stated “I understand that you would like to double the mandatory minimum.” (WBUR, October 24, 2008)

Fact Check:

Sonia Chang-Díaz has NEVER supported mandatory minimum sentences -- let alone doubling them. She has never made a statement to the contrary. Claims that she has are pure fabrication.

Senator Wilkerson and Sonia Chang-Díaz both participated in six separate debates before the primary. In several cases (Ward 4, Ward 9, Ward 11 and 19), the sponsors asked substantive questions of each candidate on matters of public safety (http://www.soniachangdiaz.com/debate2). In all instances, Sonia made her position clear.

She strongly supports gun control and has worked as a member of her church community on youth violence issues. She specifically recommended:

1. Giving kids a more hopeful sense of their own futures through rigorous education and meaningful after-school and summer programs
2. Increasing their relationships with caring adults
3. Decreasing easy access to weapons

One of the many reforms Sonia has proposed looking at is One Gun a Month, a program vigorously opposed by “Gun Rights” activists and supported by Gun Control supporters, including the Brady Campaign, which weights it as one of the most critical gun control elements. This common sense approach targets professional gun-runners who buy dozens of cheap firearms legally and resell them on street corners. The New York Times called shutting down “this deadly ‘iron pipeline’…a common sense reform.”

Dianne Wilkerson has repeatedly distorted the meaning and impact of this sensible approach by suggesting that it would have no impact on street violence that is largely committed by persons possessing illegal guns.