NEWS RELEASE

Citizens Committee for the
Right to Keep and Bear Arms
12500 N.E. Tenth Place
Bellevue, WA  98005

SAF, CCRKBA ASK CANDIDATES TO SIGN 2008 PRESIDENTIAL GUN RIGHTS PLEDGE

For Immediate Release: February 6, 2008 BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation and Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms today are transmitting to each of the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates the “2008 Presidential Gun Rights Pledge.”

In a letter to the candidates, SAF founder Alan M. Gottlieb and CCRKBA Executive Director Mark A. Taff note, “It is not enough for a candidate for this nation’s highest political office to merely mouth ‘support’ for the Second Amendment. Whoever occupies the presidency must be someone who holds the Second Amendment to be as important to individual liberty as all the other tenets of our Bill of Rights.”

“We’re asking each of the candidates to sign this pledge and go on the record in stating that the Second Amendment affirms a fundamental, individual civil right,” Gottlieb said. “We’ve heard them all claim to support the Second Amendment, but an individual civil right should not be infringed, and 85 million American gun owners have a right to know whether people who want to be trusted with the nation’s highest office are firm believers in the concept of liberty and individual freedom.”

“Our Presidential Gun Rights Pledge,” Taff added, “gives each candidate a one-time-only opportunity to either unconditionally embrace the Second Amendment or reject it. There is no middle ground, no alternative position, and no second chance. We believe the candidates will have ample time to sign or reject this pledge by Friday, February 29.”

“It is time to cut through the rhetoric,” Gottlieb observed. “With a Supreme Court ruling on the Second Amendment due in June, every candidate has an obligation to tell American gun owners just where they stand on firearms civil rights. Gun owners deserve a definitive answer from the candidates so that they can make their own decisions on who best will respect and protect their rights.”

A sample pledge is available at http://www.saf.org/sample.2008.presidential.gun.rights.pledge.pdf

With more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is one of the nation's premier gun rights organizations. As a non-profit organization, the Citizens Committee is dedicated to preserving firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected officials and facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in local communities throughout the United States. The Citizens Committee can be reached by phone at (425) 454-4911, on the internet at www.ccrkba.org or by email to InformationRequest@ccrkba.org.

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