The head of the National Rifle Association Thursday said children in America are safer because local schools have followed his recommendation to put police and armed guards at the front door to block a Sandy Hook-style attack.
“Millions of children are safer for one reason, the NRA,” said Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, speaking at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference taking place outside of Washington at Maryland’s National Harbor.
BRING IT ON, @HillaryClinton! #CPAC2016 #2A pic.twitter.com/5xda3hogY3
— NRA (@NRA) March 3, 2016
“The only way to stop a bad buy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. The politicians and the media be damned,” he said to cheers from the crowd of majority younger conservatives.
After the horrific December 2012 shooting at the Connecticut elementary school, many liberals attacked the NRA and gun owners, blaming the access to weapons for the crime. But LaPierre countered by demanding the placement of police and armed “good guys” at school doors to stop potential shooters.
“I call on Congress today to act immediately to appropriate whatever is necessary to put armed police officers in every single school in this nation and to do it now,” he said at the time.
“The political and media elites set their hair on fire. Screaming and screeching, they called me just about every evil, nasty name in the book,” he said Thursday.
“But in state legislatures and school districts all over the country, the American people began implementing what I proposed — placing trained, armed security in their schools. They didn’t wait for the president or Congress to act. They took matters into their own hands to protect their children.
“As a result, millions of our children go to school today, no longer the sitting ducks of the worst and most dangerous of all lies —gun-free zones. The news media, protected by their own armed security, will never admit it but, today, millions of children are safer for one reason — the NRA,” he said.
He also used his speech to rap President Obama and Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton who have sought to control guns.
The NRA has promised to spend record numbers to fight her and foes of the Second Amendment in the fall election and LaPierre dared her to continue her war on the NRA.
“Bring it on,” he said to cheers. “Mrs. Clinton, if you want to come after the NRA — if you want a fight over the God-given rights of America’s 100 million gun owners —if you want to turn this election into a bare-knuckled brawl for the survival of our constitutional freedom … bring it on.”
He ended his address with a call on conservatives and NRA members to join in the anti-Clinton fight. “This is the time to rise up,” said LaPierre as hundreds in the audience did just that.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected]
