January 05, 2016 02:05 PM UTC

Cory Gardner Needs a Civics Lesson, Pronto

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• by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: Raw Story reporting, Cory Gardner isn’t the only Colorado Republican catching hell for his knee-jerk response to President Barack Obama’s action on guns today:

Rep. Mike Coffman (R-CO) wrote, “.@POTUS just showed w/ #guncontrol that he has no respect for rep. government nor the limitations that Constitution places on his powers.”

The congressman represents the district where James Holmes slaughtered 12 people and injured 70 others in 2012 during a late night viewing of “The Dark Knight Rises.”

With that in mind, Twitter users unloaded on the conservative congressman who has long been a top recipient of contributions from the NRA.

“Spoken like a man who accepted handouts from the #NRA. #StopGunViolence!!!” wrote one commenter.

The pro-gun “blowback” may not be going so well this time.

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Senator Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) had an embarrassing response today to President Obama’s Executive Order expanding background checks for gun buyers.

The President is not empowered to make up his own laws when he doesn’t like the ones Congress has written. https://t.co/cXhTJ7YdKt

— Cory Gardner (@SenCoryGardner) January 5, 2016

Uhhhhhh……

Here’s Gardner’s full statement on Obama’s Executive Order, in all its idiotic glory. It’s fun to blame President Obama for stuff, but he had nothing to do with creating the “Executive Order.” While a small handful of constitutional scholars debate the legal merits of an “Executive Order,” it’s important to note that every single U.S. President has issued some sort of “executive action” while in office. If you’re choosing sides here, you can go with Gardner or everybody else — including Abraham Lincoln (the Emancipation Proclamation is probably the most famous “Executive Order”).

Gardner’s head-scratching statement was not missed by the Twitter universe. We’d encourage you to click on the original Tweet to read some of the many (many) comments that Gardner has received already. Here’s one of our personal favorites:

@SenCoryGardner I think it’s BS that the Pres just assumes that he gets to live in the White House & use Air Force One w/ out Congress’ ok. — SomeKindofJohnster (@jetotten) January 5, 2016

Former President George W. Bush issued nearly 300 Executive Orders during his time in the White House, a number that isn’t close to the all-time record of 3,522 issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt (most of which had something to do with that big war thingy).