Uproar over a fundraiser
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — As President Barack Obama tried to pass gun control legislation after a young man with an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle killed 20 children in a Connecticut elementary school, a Tennessee group started working to give away the same type of gun.
The Tennessee Firearms Association plans to give away a Bushmaster AR-15 on Monday, subject to a background check for the winner of a drawing that has already pulled in more than 10,000 contestants, executive director John Harris said.
The promotion started on April 8, more than a week before the Senate voted down a proposal for expanded background checks that was promoted by the president and supported by 90 percent of Americans, according to most polls.
While Harris said the promotion had been planned for a while, the association’s website says the goal is “to advance the effort to resist Barack Obama, the federal government and even a few in Tennessee state government who are determined to destroy your 2nd Amendment rights!!” Supporters don’t have to give money to the association to enter the drawing, but they’re encouraged to “chip in a few dollars to help support the promotion and TFA!!!”
Linda McFadyen-Ketchum, a Nashville gun control activist, said the timing of the promotion is disturbing.
McFadyen-Ketchum, a Democratic political consultant, has asked Nashville Mayor Karl Dean to rescind the city’s invitation to the National Rifle Association, which plans to bring an estimated 48,000 people here for its annual convention in 2015. She’s also on the steering committee of the state chapter of a group called Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.
“The TFA’s assault weapon giveaway just four months after Newtown and in the middle of our country’s debate about gun safety is in-your-face insensitive,” she said Wednesday. “We have to balance the right to bear arms with the right to be safe.
“A gun giveaway right now inflames emotions and does not help us achieve that goal.”
Harris and others said the AR-15, which has been called the most popular rifle in America, is actually not considered an assault weapon. Harris said gun owners often use it for recreational shooting, for “varmint or predator hunting” or in shooting competitions. And some simply like the history of the military-style gun.
The Nashville police department said in January that it will allow trained officers to carry their personal AR-15 rifles inside their vehicles while on duty.
“It has become increasingly clear that a pistol and shotgun may not be enough for an officer to stop a threat to innocent citizens,” Police Chief Steve Anderson said. “This policy change is in the best interest of public and officer safety.”
Harris dismissed McFadyen-Ketchum’s point about the Newtown, Conn., massacre, which killed 20 first-graders and six adults in December. He said the promotion was not designed to push the buttons of people concerned about that or other tragedies.
“These gun control activists, they can always pick the most recent event,” he said. “If you look back through history, there’s a long string of Newtown, Aurora, keep the list going. Under their analysis, you’d never sell a gun because someone got shot in recent history. But it has nothing to do with any prior events.”
It’s not just Democrats or gun control activists who think the firearms association sometimes goes too far with initiatives like the AR-15 giveaway.
Former state Rep. Debra Maggart of Hendersonville lost a Republican primary last year after the NRA spent close to $100,000 on advertising and mailings that opposed Maggart or supported her opponent, Courtney Rogers. The NRA wanted to punish statehouse Republicans for failing to advance legislation that would have expanded where Tennesseans could carry handguns. Maggart, who was the House Republican Caucus chairwoman, became the focus of the gun rights advocates’ campaign.
Maggart said the Tennessee Firearms Association continued to invoke her name frequently in its promotional materials even after she lost. Told of the gun giveaway, she replied, “I’m surprised they didn’t name it after me.”
If thwarting federal legislation is the point of the giveaway, Maggart said, it makes little sense, because Tennessee’s mostly Republican congressional delegation reliably supports the Second Amendment. So do the Republicans who make up a supermajority in the General Assembly, she said.
“This may illustrate perfectly what I’ve been saying all along: They create these issues to raise money. That just stokes the fire to frighten folks.”
Maggart gave Harris credit for “good marketing,” however, after the political backlash against the Newtown massacre led many gun owners to fear it would be tougher to buy an AR-15. The gun actually became more expensive in some places, according to national reports.
“He’s playing into the fear that’s out there that the gun lobby has helped create,” she said.
Harris, an attorney, said many of the state’s Republican politicians aren’t as reliable as Maggart thinks they are. He said Tennessee’s two senators, Republicans Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker are “not soundly, consistently pro-Second Amendment.” He called the so-called “guns-in-trunks” bill passed by the General Assembly this year “an abomination” and “a disaster” because it doesn’t explicitly protect people who keep their guns in their cars at work from losing their jobs.
Alexander and Corker voted earlier this month to allow a debate on gun control legislation but ultimately voted against the proposal.
Harris said the AR-15 would sell for $1,000 or so. He said the winner of the drawing will have to pay for and pass a background check within 30 days before picking up the gun from a licensed firearms dealer.