After first announcing it was too busy to attend a meeting with Joe Biden and his gun violence task force this week, Wal-Mart has suddenly found time in its schedule for the Vice President.
“We underestimated the expectation to attend the meeting on Thursday in person, so we are sending an appropriate representative to participate,” Wal-Mart spokesman David Tovar said.
These changes come after the retailer was met with serious criticism for missing the Biden meetings — held on Wednesday and Thursday — especially since the National Rifle Association and the National Shooting Sports Foundation will be in attendance. Victims’ groups and advocates for gun owners will also be at the meetings, among other groups.
Wal-Mart originally said it would miss the meeting because its top executives would be at the monthly sales meetings in Bentonville, Ark.
Following the Sandy Hook shooting, Wal-Mart removed the listing for the Bushmaster AR-15 from its website. (The retailer does not sell guns online, but asks buyers to input their zip codes to see if a nearby store carries a particular gun.)
Back in 2008, the company adopted the “Responsible Firearms Retailer Partnership” code of conduct from Mayors Against Illegal Guns.
While Tovar said Wal-Mart is “very purposeful” about keeping a healthy balance between serving sportsmen and being a responsible gun dealer — and the company hasn’t gone nearly as far as Dick’s Sporting Goods — the way in which Wal-Mart has bowed to criticism in this area might be cause for concern when it comes to gun rights as a whole.
Especially since more than 120,000 people have signed a petition to ban assault weapons from Wal-Mart shelves. Will the company cave to that pressure too?
