"Firearms and Freedom" with Gabby Franco

And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. Welcome to The Politics Prepping and Paranormal Podcast. Flibbity-jibbity nonsense. I thought it was terrific. It's not just big, it's you. Welcome to the Politics, Prepping, and Paranormal Podcast. My name is Jeff Morey and I'm your host. Before I welcome my guests this week, I wanted to say a big thank you to the good folks over at TruePrepper.com for the second year in a row and my second year in podcasting, I have once again made their annual list of the best prepper podcasts. While the list is technically a top ten list, and I did not make the top ten, I did, however, once again make it as an honorable mention. Now, for some people, that may just seem like a participation trophy, But for me, considering also once again that my show is the only show that is not 100% dedicated to prepping, I'm honored for the recognition. Especially more towards the end of 2025, I did not do a lot of prepper themed and preparedness shows at all. Well, this year I hope to change that. For me, being a prepper isn't just about preparing for the unknown. It's also about having situational awareness, not only of your immediate surroundings, but of our world and our nation in general. I am what is called a geopolitical prepper, meaning I watch and try to anticipate potential global instability and events that could potentially, and probably will, cause wars, famine, economic collapse, social upheaval, and a multitude of other potential doomsday scenarios. This is why we pray out, and this is why the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is so important. And this week, I'm honored to welcome a great patriot and a true champion of the Second Amendment. Her name is Gabby Franco, and she is a former Olympian, a firearms instructor, competitive shooter, motivational speaker, author, army wife and mother. and you may also know her from the hit history channel TV show, Top Shot. From Venezuela, the official line there is that American freedom is a lie. Even if you don't believe it, you're supposed to keep it quiet. As a woman, as a shooter, as a Venezuelan and U.S. citizen, I'll continue to speak up for our freedoms because I know what can happen when people stop talking about their rights. The problem is not doing too much. The problem is not doing enough of what matters. So without further ado, I want to welcome my guest this week, Gabby Franco. Welcome, Gabby. Hey, thank you, Jeff. Thank you for having me. For anyone that does not know you, would you take a few minutes and tell them about your background and your story? Sure. So I was born and raised in Venezuela. I grew up in a middle class, very driven family. My dad was just very, how you say, every time he saw a problem, he will always find a way to fix it. And I kind of got that personality from my dad to, and striving to do things. And he introduced myself and my siblings to the shooting sports. He was, he went to the gun range to get a class to get his concealed carry license. When in Venezuela was allowed, people were allowed to carry concealed because, believe or not, people in Venezuela at one point were allowed to own firearms and have concealed carry license and all that stuff. And I went to the range and I didn't necessarily fell in love with firearms, if you will, because I was always surrounded by firearms. My dad was an avid hunter. He was all the time going out and hunting and we saw rifles and shotguns. But I did for sure fell in love with that challenge of trying to shoot a bullseye. Because the first introduction to us, it was not regular target shooting with a 9mm. It was actually an air pistol. He saw these kids at the range that were shooting these weird guns. And he's like, what are they doing? And that's when he learned that they had an Olympic shooting team, a junior Olympic shooting team. So he was like, hmm, I have three girls at home. So he brought us in and, you know, how difficult could it be to stand up? I don't have to move. The target doesn't move. And shoot that target at 10 meters offhand and the bull size, the diameter is about one centimeter. I thought it was very easy. And it turned out to be very, very challenging. me and every time like I guess that drive that that I had from my dad like I tried and tried and tried and that constant trying and that constant trying to do the best I could led to me becoming part of the state team the shooting team of the state then part of the national team and until ultimately I went to the Olympic Games in Sydney 2000 something that to be honest I thought only super humans would go to the olympic games as a as a teenager that's what i always thought but it was like surreal for me and moved to the united states after a few years under hugo chavez and hearing friends cuban friends who constantly talked about how hugo chavez was turning venezuela upside was going to turn Venezuela into a Cuba and I moved I applied for an extraordinary ability visa uh with my back uh my background as a as an Olympian and all that my curriculum as an athlete um and five years later so I became a U.S. citizen and of course there's a lot more to my story like I was like there's a lot more to it than that yes yes yes I mean it's crazy sometimes I don't see myself as an old lady although soon to be 45 believe it or not and I'm very proud of that number but I have had a life full of adventures challenges you know things that people would say would tell me like my ex-husband that I was a woman without motivation imagine that um and so yeah that no it was well he was delusional wasn't he but you know what that's a part of that comes with sometimes we forget who we truly are and we get so immersed in what other people that are close to you think who you are so what I'm trying to say with this is that I have, like everybody in life, I have had my ups and down like very lows, very lows and very highs. And the one thing that has kept me you know, everything together is what I've learned in Olympic shooting. You know, the mental aspect, the mental performance, the thought of okay, I'm low, I'm rock bottom because I was there. There's nothing. And yet, I can come out of here if I put my head into what I need to do. So that's a little bit of not only my background, but also my personality. And too, life goes on, you know, until that one right there, until God calls me to go back home. I'm here for the ride. Your story is just, it's awesome and it's inspiring. Looking back, I mean, everything you've been through, everything you've done, Is there anything you do differently at this point? I don't think I would do anything differently, if you will, but I would probably approach things. And again, I guess it all depends with your age. You know, when you're young, you think things so, so take things so personal, right? To give you an example, there was an athlete, the father of an athlete, who thought that his son had more merits than I had to not only go to the Pan American Games in 1999, but even after I won the silver medal, who was Olympic plaza, to go to the Sydney Olympics, he even sued the Venezuelan Shooting Federation to put his son in replacing me. minded I was national champion I had earned my spot and all that stuff right and um and I actually had a conversation with people who were involved from the Venezuelan Shooting Federation in that early this year because I don't know the conversation came up and they even sent me the the lawsuit because he you know and they were telling me Gabby he had no merits because the Venezuelan Shooting Federation had nothing to do with the Olympic Committee right The Olympic Committee says there a woman who earned that spot You cannot replace that with a man period no matter what especially in today we don know right? Unfortunately, but in 2000, that was a no, no, for sure. And so I was so nervous. And that obviously impacted me, but I didn't know that. I didn't know that for sure, no matter what I was going to go. In my mind as a teenager, just having the fact that somebody was trying to take my spot, I didn't know because the lawsuit, the whole thing ended like a week or so before flying to the Olympic Games. So all that stress, all that mental stress affected, if you will, me in all sense as an athlete personally. And so if I could change something, anything, I would say would have talked to them, to those in the shooting federation. Oh, would have hopefully, you know, they told me, Gabby, don't worry, nothing's going to happen. This has no merit and everything is going to be fine. I don't think probably wouldn't have won a medal either way, but I think the experience would have been a little bit different. but other than that other than that all those experiences all those challenges i have built and i know sounds cliche right like oh everything i had invented back built who i am today but it truly is you know it truly is but i would say perhaps that would be the only one just because it was very very hard yeah i can only imagine what doesn't kill you makes you stronger right don't they always say that it has although you don't you don't feel like it when you're going through it you're like this thing is really killing me you know and and it's like that you know when my ex-husband when I when we separated and like I'm saying he thought I was a woman who didn't have motivations who uh minded I just went I had gone to Olympic Games I've traveled to 12 countries before I even met him and all that stuff but um I just I just you know and and a week after I lost my job like I was rock bottom dead and everything but it's it's I have to say more than that it doesn't break you it makes you right I think what it does it transforms you that time not only I think it's a different way of I see it differently in that sense it's It's not like it broke me because when you're thinking that way, you're thinking on the negative. Like what I'm not, why it did not happen instead of thinking what really happened. And in my case, what it really happened is it transformed me completely. Internally, mentally, it makes me stronger, right? Like you're saying, it makes you stronger. But in the sense that I don't see myself, I see myself in a different level, if you will. Like when you see yourself as a kid and you are not a kid anymore, you're a teenager. You're not a teenager anymore and you're an adult, right? Now I'm not just an adult, but I'm a wiser adult. So in that sense. Well said. Well, we, most everybody these days knows you for your work with 2A movement. You're multi-talented. You can do so many different things. You've done so many different things, but I know you're a strong advocate for the second amendment. I think one of my absolute favorite statements or quotes I hear from time to time is there would be no First Amendment without the Second Amendment. And I think today more than ever that that reigns true. Why would you say that that's true? I guess the closest example I can bring forward is Venezuela, right? Venezuela. In Venezuela, we never had necessarily, I'm not going to say never, but at least for the past 50, 60 years, we never had something called the Second Amendment. I don't think we ever had something like that, even before. It was always a privilege. The government gave the people the privilege to own firearms. And what was that taking away from us? It was interesting because you couldn't defend yourself, right? But at the same time, you couldn't talk because those who were, for example, in this case, in favor of Hugo Chavez or supported Hugo Chavez, they were very aggressive in the way they approached you. They didn't care. It was not like, hey, you know, I disagree with you and have a disagreement. No, they will be and attack you. And many of them were criminals who were supported by Hugo Chavez, and he let them use firearms. And so it turned out that it was the opposition who became silent. So there was obviously no idea of dissent. There was no idea of trying to express yourself. It was not ever respected once that happened. And even before that, it was, well, before that, Venezuela had a different political, a lot of, I would say, political parties. And people would have their disagreements. And people, you know, brothers would not be brothers anymore because they hated each other. But it just ended like that. When Hugo Chavez came, he became violent. And when the gun control came, he just turned out in chaos. So I would say, you know, the government, they control everything. And on a population they can control, especially one that is disarmed, there's nothing you can say, only to agree with them. I had a guest on a while back, my buddy Jake Dimes, the owner of Tacticon Armament. He said it well. I asked him a very similar question, and he said the citizens should own as much firepower as the government, basically. He worded it a little differently, but I can't remember exactly how he worded it, but he nailed it, and I was just like, yeah. As politicians, and speaking of that, as politicians and special interest groups try hard to strip away our rights concerning owning and carrying firearms, what in particular do you see as the biggest challenges in the coming years both in your now home state of texas and in the united states as a whole for the second amendment yes well i think most people focus on the federal level and i think we need to focus more at state level um you know these little laws in here lost in there oh this state this this uh county can to do this and so it makes them a lot more difficult for us um and and i think in in a sense it's just that democrats are very very bold in the way they approach they are not being trying to sneak in and trying to be um oh we're just gonna cover what we want to know they're actually very open what they want to do and i think even beyond that i think the challenge or we can be our worst enemy okay in the firearms industry and i say this is because i hear a lot of people who say oh god thank you for speaking up or oh such and such thank you for standing up and speaking up but they don't you know um there were there even there were even um uh statistics and numbers showing that the the gun owners were one one demographic that vote the less you know and we have right now the second term coming the elections in 2026 and so you know we talk about oh yeah championing the second amendment i love the second amendment but then still that mentality of oh that would you know they're not going to do anything i will have my second amendment forever well they forget that that quote is kind of a reality today because there's people who are behind the scenes really doing the hard work on the flip side many of those believe or not you know not to to to shun on them but some people have been doing for so many years they're getting older is there is it really a new generation who's willing to put their heart and soul into it and and do the work, right? And so I would say that's a challenge that we have, not only now, but in the immediate, but also in the future, right? That we're becoming a society that we're so worried about so many things, social media and all this stuff where we need to focus on things that really matter. There's too many people these days that kids, that's all they do is they spend their time on their phones and on social media. They don't get outside, period. They don't get outside. and shooting is just an awesome way to get outside and to gain skills, to gain experience, to, I don't know. I love skeet shooting myself. I got two kids now. I don't have a lot of time anymore, but I used to shoot for my high school hunter safety team, and there's nothing as challenging to me. I love shooting skeet. I wish, you know, my dream is for us to eventually get a big farm and move out and have me, you know, a nice electronic skeet thrower that I can get out there and just shoot. And I'd love for my girls who grew up doing that, you know, and I think too many people these days, kids just don't do that anymore. And you know what? And even besides shooting, I think it's also important to make it more into the reading, you know, explaining the children. Because shooting alone is fun, but doesn't explain to you exactly why the Second Amendment is important, right? just having fun? Is that it? Right? Had a great time. Great. But is that it? Is that why the Second Amendment is there No Right And so I think start truly teaching our children not only taking them to the range but could be weekly reading part of the Constitution analyzing it I mean I an owl Every time when I lived in I just moved from Virginia to Texas just a month ago And I lived there for about six years. And every time I'll go to see the Constitution, I was like, and reading about it. I'm like, this is just amazing. And so many people take it for granted, right? But, you know, that's, I think, what we have to do also with our children is really reinforce that, the importance of it. Absolutely. I think it should be required reading for elementary school kids, in my personal opinion. For sure. Definitely. Speaking of 2A, there's a lot of organizations out there, you know, that claim to champion the Second Amendment. What are your thoughts? Are there any organizations in particular that you think are leading the charge, so to speak, and are having the biggest impact? Well, I think Good Owners of America is a good one. They lead the adventures. I mean, they have been boosting a lot of stuff. I really support them and follow them. Yeah, they're doing a very good, great job. I'm also, I would say, Second Amendment Foundation. They also do a good job out there. And there are also lawyers that are not necessarily, how do you say, part of an organization per se. Like I've been part of some briefs where I put my name. And it is very interesting that they are there and I get their emails. So there are many people out there, interestingly, that are not the big names, but they're doing their part for sure in their states. right? Good owners of America is a more national and we see the big names the same thing as Second Amendment Foundation but there are other leagues, for instance Virginia, the Virginia I think the Citizen or Conceal I don't remember their name but they do an amazing job in Virginia and in each state so I really encourage people that although those big names are there yes, support them because it's important but also pay attention to the ones that you local you know san diego gun owners um i know them too very well there are many different organizations locally that they need your support not only monetarily although it's important but also when they say hey you know this is happening in our state this is happening in your county we need you to come in and be for testimony provide a testimony uh we need these for you know any other support that they need doesn't necessarily have to be monetary but they probably need your presence and your support in other sense so yeah it's it's it's i guess in in my position that i've been able to see these the the big ones but also the big umbrella how they also trickles down from state to state and from even different cities um it's fascinating and kind of give me that hope, you know, like, okay, you know, it's not just the big names that we see, but there are other ones that also are doing their, you know, little ant work, working hard in their states and also in their cities. Yeah. All right. I want to shift gears for a minute and you know, you know, I don't want to ask you about, because I don't think there is literally anyone more qualified to talk about this subject than you. Okay. What are your thoughts on the current situation in Venezuela? And did President Trump and the United States do the right thing removing Nicolas Maduro from office and expediting him to the United States to stand trial for criminal charges, including drug trafficking and narco-terrorism? I do believe so. And I think the vast majority of Venezuelans, who obviously those are not connected to the government, would agree with that President Trump did. Venezuela is an amazing country, no, because I was born there. But Hugo Chavez, that socialist ideology, turn it upside down. And the problem with that, and that's what happened in Maduro, is that when you give so much power to the government, and you may say that the idea initially was great. now we had a completely incompetent individual very greedy who didn't care about society and now he has all the power and this man for years was torturing i mean horrible stories um about in venezuela and it was not only turning venezuela in cuba 2.0 it was worse because he was becoming the hub of cartels, of drug cartels, but also Hezbollah. I mean, people don't realize it. In the island of Margarita, there weren't even people were like, okay, this looks, areas look like Muslims, Chinese, Russian. They were getting the oil for free, just for power. This was just an exchange of power. Not only that, they were giving money. We think about China, China, and Russia, and Iran. But also you had Cuba, you had Nicaragua, you had Brazil, you even had Bolivia, who were literally draining Venezuela, what the Venezuelan people were just suffering. And Maduro just made it worse. So what Trump did was not only something that Venezuelan has been asking for years, but also what he needed to happen, because I do not believe any other president would have the goals. No, absolutely not. That Trump has to do what he did. And so for sure, this man not only needs to and, you know, he's not the only one. He's just the tip of the iceberg. if we're honest. What do you think about Delce Rodriguez taking over? Because she was a Maduro loyalist. Do you think that this Venezuela is going to flourish under her leadership? Or do you think that if she doesn't basically follow the program with what Trump says, you think we need to remove her and put somebody in place that will? Obviously, I don't know what Trump has in mind, if you will. right i'm not in the trump administration but i would say that if this is a game of chess i would say that keeping her was the right move because you know people think it is easy to say oh you know i'm just a president yeah but you need to run the press the whole country and if you don't have the people under you if you don't know them because one thing one thing people don't know is that the vast majority of leaders from the opposition in Venezuela are overseas right so you can tell you want oh I'm gonna I am a good CEO I'm a good leader I'm a good leader but you have never worked in that business and you know on top of that you don't have a connection with those people that you're gonna work on you're gonna fail and so I think that having her for now trying to move things and maneuver him and the way that he wants to maneuver is the right move and i would even dare to guess that he's just telling her you know what you're not going to stay there flat out you are not going to stay there whatsoever this is this is just your payment okay this is a payment this is what you have to pay for everything you have done and you're going to do what I say and how I said and then you're gonna get out period right um so this is you know obviously a long guess but I think that that's a move Venezuela wouldn't be wouldn't be able to succeed again you know under her lead if she was truly leading on her own you know thinking and ideology no whatsoever um so especially when you have other people like cabellos uh which is he's is these people are just animals okay they they they just treated other venezuelans and the political prisoners like nothing. So they don't deserve anything. But if to maintain Venezuela in a good course, this is what I have to do, I do agree. And eventually change it. And I'm 100%, well, not 100%, I always said 99% that that's what should happen. You think the majority of all the citizens of Venezuela support it, support what's going on and what's happened, what the United States has done and intervene? You know, it's difficult to say that with certainty because it's easy to say it from outside. Okay. I'm here at home. I'm safe. Everything's fine. It's easy for me to say, yeah, everybody's, you know, I cannot discount those who I've spoken to and are concerned. Right. Because sometimes, especially at the beginning, after everything that happened, they were saying, Gabby, everything is so calm, but so calm, they give you goosebumps. Right. instead of a calm that wow this is nice no it's a calmness that you don't know what's going to happen and um they started doing some arrests if you had that was um one of the news a few days ago um that they were starting arresting people if you had anything related to trump i've heard that i heard there gangs and um i heard some bad reports coming out of venezuela right right So it not easy to say It would be very you know irresponsible for me to say that everybody just super happy They I would say deeply they know this needed to happen But also is the uncertainty uncertainty. Right. Again, that doesn't take the merit of taking Maduro. One thing the American people need to understand that there's no change doesn't come with consequences. consequences and sometimes you know it has to get worse because it gets before it gets better even a woman who gets out of an abusive relationship is not like flowers and party right after that right there's a process there's a change there's an adjustment so the way venezuela is going to go through a difficult time i have no doubt but um it's a time it needed to happen so we wouldn't Venezuela wouldn't turn into, oh my God, worse than Cuba because Cuba had nothing to offer to anybody else, but Venezuela had a lot to offer. And Cuba, China, Iran was taking advantage of all of it. Yeah. I think we're in it for the long haul. I mean, I think, you know, I don't agree or support necessarily support everything president Trump does, but I think, you know, for the most part, he's a man of his word and I think he's going to support Venezuela. I think we're going to, you know we're going to be there for the long haul to make sure that things get straightened out like you said it's going to get worse work it's better i mean that's just the life so it does and you know some people say oh like i had some comments oh he's gonna drain you know venezuela with the oil i'm like listen let me tell you how much would you pay for your freedom and i see this situation with the oil like a business transaction because money alone doesn't do anything right you can have a lot of money but if you don't reproduce it if you don't make more money it's gonna go to back to zero so the same thing in venezuela venezuela we have a lot of resources which is only potential right we have nothing unless you turn that into something that you can sell that you can make money of it it's almost like just potential right and so having instead somebody that can say hey you are the united states i have all this stuff i give you a stake on my business right here's some invest in me you give me your resources your intelligence all the brains to make this work let's work together and i think that's the that that's the problem that happened around the world that countries fought tremendously the united states just for the fear sheer of fighting oh they're coming and again it may sound very for some people a little bit far-fetched my thinking But I think like that, I think you have to think about, okay, what do you offer? Are you going to help us be a better country? Let's go. Let's do it. You know what I mean? But it's just like constantly the negative, like the Democrats. It's only, oh, this is horrible. I'm like, okay, most Venezuelans are cheering about it, and you're just crying for the dictator. How does that even make sense? Well, they're going to – it doesn't matter what Trump does. I mean the Democrats are going to – they're going to find a way to twist it and to turn it against him to make him look like the bad guy. I love the memes I see all the time that say for Trump's next trick, watch, he's going to make the Democrats support Russia or whatever. And it's true because it doesn't matter what he does. They're going to find a way to twist it to turn it against him. Right, but I think it's the same mentality when people think about the United States, right? No matter what the United States says they're going to do in your country and they're going to help you and all this, people, there's this huge government. No, they're just going to come and do ugly. I'm like, hey, I would, for those people who didn't like Trump before, I would say, I'll change Maduro if I didn't live here, of course. If I was in Venezuela, living in Venezuela, I would say, change your Trump for Maduro, okay? And make Venezuela great again. You know what I mean? There you go. Well, we will. We will. Look, I appreciate your perspective on that, Gabby. Like I said, I don't think there's anybody that is more qualified to talk about than you right now. All right. Look, I want to congratulate you on recently earning your master's in sport and performance psychology and also being nominated for the Gundy Awards. what's next for you in your career and what's still on your bucket list of things you want to accomplish yeah so like you said this was a great you know win for me doing my master's for those of you who don't know I did my bachelor's and my master's back to back just I started my my bachelor's when I was what 38 without ever going to the United States to school in the United States. I did my high school in Venezuela. So I never wrote a paper. I didn't know grammar and I went straight to university. So for me, this is a huge, huge win. If I had a magic wand and I would have to say, this is the job I would like to do. I would say I will work with astronauts. Yeah, mental performance or I like high risk. so that would be like my ultimate dream right work in space program as a mental yeah as a mental performance consultant and now as I'm starting in this career and having my background and shooting so my my my next one will be law enforcement I do want to bring my knowledge in and shooting precision, but also mental performance with a better application, right, in a more personal and more detailed manner to help law enforcement. So that's the next. I'm talking to Walter Arms, who is my big, big sponsor. So trying to get those connections, get me, you know, foot at the door, just because, as you know, I work for law enforcement in Pennsylvania, Washington State, Florida. But it's a tiny niche, and it's understandable. You know, they have been, I'm not going to say hit, if you will, or so much negativity. So they're very guarded, and it's understandable. But I would like to work with them, working on a book, working on a children's book. Nothing related with guns, nothing related with. Oh, come on. I'd love to have my few daughters read the book about guns. I think that would be awesome. Yeah, but actually, I'm just working on it slowly, but surely. But as I started teaching children to go out and find true wisdom, you know, what is out there. So hopefully I get it done in a year or so. So there's lots now for me. I'm new in Texas again, even though I lived here six years ago. and trying to get my way back into, you know, my husband is active duty. So he's kind of his life is set. It's just the army wives who are the ones who have to reinvent. We have to reinvent ourselves with every move. So, you know, and I love the challenge. I like it. It gives me an opportunity to say, okay, you did that before. This is another opportunity. What else? Let's do this a little bit different and make it work. right i have zero doubt you can accomplish whatever you put your mind to zero working on it well when you're not shooting training someone to shoot or continue an education or any one of a million other things uh what do you like to do for fun what's what's your spare time and what's your hobbies what do you like to do man my husband says i'm like um what he said he says i'm like a renaissance woman because yes because if you if you're in my home you would think there's two different women in here one who you know have guns and you can see my backpack I have me have a knife or something like that but I also do painting crocheting kneading I'm impressed yeah I love art um I'm very creative I like designing and love doing stuff with my son um I mean and and I like to create like I tell my son instead of like we're gonna about to get a new kitty and he's like mama we need to get him a cat tower I'm like no we're gonna make it so you know i am like that if i get my hands with tools and create something like build something that's my ultimate so i like i like that creativity um writing so i do kind of quite a few stuff sometimes i'm like which one i should do which one i should do first but um if more than anything um i just love being a wife believe it or not i love being a mom uh being you know the house and i do all the stuff i do and very independent woman and everything in that sense like we see in the modern times that i love love being a wife and a and a mommy there's nothing like being a parent I swear for sure well Gabby thank you so much I appreciate the time I look forward to your future endeavors and just to see what you do next yeah thank you for having me thank you for listening to the politics prepping and paranormal podcast your source for real news and analysis on politics, prepping, paranormal, conspiracy theories, and the volatile state of the world we live in. Tune in next week and every week for a new episode and stay safe, stay healthy, and stay vigilant.