Liberals balk at Ed Martin's praiseworthy initiative to get guns off the streets of D.C. because he's charging too many blacks.

But blacks make up 96 percent of victims and suspects in D.C. shooting cases.

Ed Martin is the interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. He’s quite controversial, for good reason.

However, one of the programs he’s implemented should not be controversial — his initiative to get guns off the streets of D.C.

Under Martin’s initiative, prosecutors are ordered to make every felony gun possession case a federal one. Doing so means these cases will be brought in federal court where they are more likely to result in longer prison sentences. The shift to federal court will also prevent people 24 years old and younger from qualifying for the District’s Youth Rehabilitation Act, which results in a lighter sentence.

According to the Washington Post, the initiative focuses on felons — a cohort that is not allowed to carry guns in the city. In all of the cases brought so far by Martin, the person charged with the gun crime was a felon.

Gun violence is a massive problem in D.C. (see below), as it is in most cities. Liberals complain about it, advocating gun control as the solution.

Arresting felons who illegally possess firearms and prosecuting them in courts that generally issue harsh sentences is a form of gun control. It gets armed felons off the streets and keeps them off for a long time.

Yet, according to the Post, Martin is facing a strong backlash against his initiative. The Post itself clearly is displeased.

Why? Because the policy has a “disparate impact” on blacks.

Martin’s office says that in the month since he announced his plan, it has charged 18 felons with federal gun possession crimes. All 18 are black men,

But why is that an argument against Martin’s program? Is there any evidence that white felons caught in possession of firearms are not being prosecuted? The Post presents none, and I very much doubt such evidence exists.

In fact, the numerical disparity the Post cites and similar disparities associated with past programs like Martin’s are fully explained by the fact that blacks make up the overwhelming majority of felons carrying firearms in D.C. According to this source, 96 percent of victims and suspects in both homicides and nonfatal shootings are black. Thus, the fact that so far 18 of 18 charges under Martin’s initiative are against blacks provides no basis for inferring that blacks are being discriminated against or unfairly targeted.

It might well be true, as the Post suggests, that Martin’s initiative has focused on black neighborhoods. But given the fact that blacks make up 96 percent of victims and suspects in homicide cases, it seems clear that it’s neighborhoods plagued by gun violence, not blacks per se, that are being targeted.

That’s an entirely reasonable approach. Indeed, it would be ridiculous to focus an initiative to get guns off the street on white neighborhoods in D.C. Georgetown doesn’t have a gun violence problem that would justify devoting special resources to getting guns off its streets.

The right way to think about a gun control initiative like Martin’s is that it disproportionately protects blacks from gun violence, not that it disproportionately results in jail time for blacks. The latter form of thinking puts the sympathy with criminals. The former puts the sympathy with victims, where it belongs.

The Post also complains that Martin’s initiative comes “even as D.C. is experiencing a sharp decline in violent crime.” But 3,469 violent crimes were reported in D.C. last year, including 187 homicides. These numbers aren’t good. Certainly, they aren’t good enough to make a case against initiatives that will help bring the numbers down. Nor have they caused any noticeable diminution of calls by liberals for the kinds of gun control they favor.

Some critics of Martin’s initiative say he should focus on stopping the entry of guns into the District. But Martin apparently is doing this, too.

He says his office is working with other federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, to identify firearms being transported from southern Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia into Washington. “That is a priority,” he states. “We now have new leadership in these agencies, and they can help us go up the chain and try to cut the supply.”

I’m not a fan of Ed Martin. But I am a fan of his efforts to curb violence in D.C. Anyone who believes that black lives matter should be.