By Dave Workman
Senior Editor
The Second Amendment Foundation has launched an ambitious campaign to promote personal protection and point to the racial inequalities inherent in gun control laws, calling it Equal Gun Rights (EGR), with a short video and website that simply says Self-defense is a human right.
It is aimed at showing how gun control laws affect far more inner city minority citizens, who are often disarmed by local ordinances that discourage gun ownership by making it so cumbersome.
“You won’t see President Obama or his anti-gun cohorts admitting it,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb, “but the simple fact is that gun control has historically disarmed far more African Americans than any other demographic. And, as you can see in our video spot, African-Americans and other minorities are still the primary victims of gun control laws in America.”
SAFs launch was timed coincidentally to the anti-gun campaign initiated by Organizing for Action against lawmakers who oppose President Barack Obama’s gun control agenda. Because the Equal Gun Rights campaign began within days of the OFA effort, many see it as a direct response.
OFA is a group founded by the president and some of his “close advisors” that grew out of his 2012 campaign organization. They are targeting 16 Republican lawmakers with online advertising that pounds them on their pro-rights resistance.
SAF’s new EqualGunRights.com video features citizens from different parts of the country commenting on their local gun laws. It offers a noticeable contrast between people who live in regions with laws that enable citizens to exercise their rights, and those who reside in areas with restrictive gun laws which typically have larger minority populations, including Chicago, Washington D.C. and New York City.
Gottlieb had been working on the gun rights and personal protection campaign for several days, but when OFA launched its on-line attack against the pro-gun Congressional Republicans, he scrambled to get the EGR effort up and running to provide a quick counter strike.
It appears the OFA effort is part of a larger liberal push for gun control. Another attack ad, against pro-gun Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell, has been launched by BoldProgressives.org. A group calling itself the Progressive Change Campaign Committee is running a 30-second anti-McConnell spot featuring a man identified as Gary Nutt of Cub Run, Ky. Introducing himself as a Vietnam veteran, Nutt criticizes McConnell for opposing a ban on so-called “assault weapons” because they are not necessary for deer hunting.
Armed with a scoped Marlin lever-action rifle, Nutt says he only fired his rifle once last fall.
“One shot, one deer,” he says. “But I’d be a pretty bad hunter if I needed an assault rifle to shoot that buck.”
The SAF Equal Gun Rights video spot was produced in collaboration with Political Media. The EqualGunRights.com (EGR) message highlights the disproportionate impact of gun control laws on African-Americans, Latinos and other minorities, and how it leaves large groups unable to defend themselves, their families, or their businesses.
Gottlieb said it is “unconscionable that…so-called progressives are quietly permitting laws to stand that disproportionately diminish the rights of minorities.”
“The late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was blocked by segregationists when he tried to get his concealed carry permit,” he recalled, “because they knew equal strength to defend oneself leads to societal equality.”
“I hope that people across this country will join us at EqualGunRights.com and demand an end to this discrimination,” Gottlieb said. “It doesn’t matter where you live, or what kind of neighbors you have – all law abiding citizens should be able to arm and defend themselves. “
