By offering rabidly anti-gun Rep. Carolyn McCarthy a plum opportunity to promote legislation expanding the ban on so-called “assault weapons” during their convention next week, the Democratic Party is once again showing its true colors to millions of American gun owners, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) said today.
“For months, everywhere you turned, Democrats have been out hustling gun owners for their votes, trying to portray themselves as pro-Second Amendment. Giving McCarthy a microphone proves Democrats haven’t abandoned their failed gun control policies,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “What would the press be saying if Republicans allowed a recognized gun rights proponent like Rep. Don Young to urge his colleagues to let that ban expire?”
McCarthy’s husband was murdered by a deranged racist gunman named Colin Ferguson, who also wounded her son in a shooting on a commuter train in 1993. Ferguson did not use a so-called “assault weapon” in that crime, but a handgun he purchased in California-a state with some of the most restrictive gun laws in the nation.
“Democrats may as well erase any credibility they may have gained among gun owners over the past two years,” Gottlieb observed. “So much for John Kerry’s pheasant hunting and skeet shooting photo ops with borrowed firearms, or any other lip service that Democrats are offering gun owners back in their districts. Allowing McCarthy a forum to campaign against the firearms rights of millions of law-abiding Americans in the middle of their national convention should tell firearms owners all they need to know about the true Democrat agenda.”
Gottlieb said he was “disappointed, but hardly surprised” that convention planners and party leaders are giving McCarthy the podium. In balance, he suggested, Democrats should also offer retiring Georgia Sen. Zell Miller equal time at the microphone to tell his fellow Democrats why they are wrong to to campaign for irresponsible gun control measures.
“If there were more Democrats like Miller, and fewer like McCarthy,” Gottlieb stated, “the party would not have to be camouflaging its true sentiments behind borrowed shotguns and hunter orange. We’re urging all gun owners to listen to McCarthy’s speech, listen to the applause it elicits from the party leadership, and then decide whether Democrats deserve to be trusted with their Second Amendment rights.”
