(IntegrityTimes.com) – After 208 years of operation in the small town of Ilion, New York, gunmaker Remington is officially closing its doors and relocating. While the company announced its new headquarters in Georgia back in 2021, the decision to close the New York facility came just last year.
When the new facility was announced, RemArms CEO Ken D’Arcy said in a statement that the company was looking forward to opening in a state that “enthusiastically supports and welcomes companies in the firearms industry.” The upcoming closure has hit Ilion residents hard, including Mayor John P. Stephens. One employee said that five members of his family currently work at the location, including his wife.
The city of 7,600 will lose around $1 million in revenue and 300 jobs. Mayor Stephens said that the historical loss to the city “is almost, if not bigger than, the financial loss.” The Ilion location currently manufactures several hundred guns each day, but some workers have already started training for new jobs with the New York Department of Labor. United Workers of America Local 717 president Frank Brown said that the state’s gun laws were not the reason that Remington chose to move. He believes that the company chose to relocate out of greediness.
In recent years, New York lawmakers have written several pieces of legislation to target gun manufacturers and gun owners. The landmark Bruen decision by the United States Supreme Court has not deterred New York lawmakers from passing more laws restricting firearms. Some of the laws have been struck down by state judges, but others will eventually wind up at the Supreme Court. Legislators from various blue states have passed restrictive gun laws, only to have them struck down in court as well. Other gun manufacturers have relocated operations, including Smith & Wesson. It relocated its headquarters from Massachusetts to Tennessee in 2021, citing Tennessee’s commitment to the Second Amendment.
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