by Dave Workman | Senior Editor
When anti-gunners went after Kroger and Panera Bread, a groundswell of support for the right to keep and bear arms was immediate and overwhelming, thanks to unscientific opinion polls launched by MSNBC and CNBC.
The results amounted to a repudiation of the campaign, launched largely by the Michael Bloomberg-funded Everytown for Gun Safety and Moms Demand Action groups. The gun prohibition lobbying organizations declared victory when Panera Bread asked customers not to bring guns into their facilities, while Kroger simply stated that it would follow state law, and didn’t ban anyone.
An MSNBC poll asking whether Kroger shoppers should be allowed to carry handguns was coming in with 85% in favor and only 15% opposed. A CNBC poll on the Panera Bread decision was running at 84% support for gun rights and 11% against. An MSNBC poll on the Panera Bread request was also coming in at 75% in favor of armed customers, and 25% against guns.
Panera’s bakery and café shops were just the latest to disinvite armed gunowners, following the Starbucks, Chipolte, Target and Kroger model.
There was no small amount of irony in the gun ban efforts. While the Moms group was pressing Kroger for a gun ban in its stores, a couple of stories quickly reinforced the notion that it’s safer to carry. In Indianapolis, an alleged would-be robber was fatally shot by an armed citizen outside a bank branch near a Kroger. A violent attack by a mob of youths outside a Kroger in Memphis that was caught on video provided more evidence that it might be better to have a gun and not need it, than the other way around.
The flap is just the latest chapter in an ongoing effort by the anti-gun Moms group to push private property gun bans, essentially turning private companies into surrogates for their gun control agenda.
Bloomberg-supported groups have spent small fortunes to stigmatize gunowners over the past couple of years. Efforts launched by the Moms group and the Brady Campaign have targeted coffee shops, chain stores and grocery chains. A group calling itself Open Carry Texas has in recent months staged rallies at stores and inside several dining chains. The moms’ group circulated photos from those events, which show people carrying so-called assault rifles and other large guns inside popular dining chains, as part of a campaign to convince the companies to adopt no-gun policies.
Some reports claim that Moms Demand Action recently launched a six-figure advertising campaign to pressure Kroger, the nation’s largest grocery chain, to also ask customers to not bring guns into its stores.
The companies that have decided to ask customers to leave guns at home have framed the new policy as a request, saying that they do not want to put employees in the position of confronting an armed customer.
Panera, based in St. Louis, is a $2.4 billion company with nearly 2,000 locations. It has not previously been the target of a protest effort by Moms Demand Action, though in a statement, the group’s founder Shannon Watts said the decision followed “months of discussion between Panera and Moms Demand Action.”
Meanwhile, some politicians have been trying to get merchants in their cities to post their businesses with “No guns allowed” signs, another effort to force private enterprises to join them in establishing more “gun free” zones.
