NRA Not Allowed To Talk About Anything Following Shooting :: 11/15/2019

What happened in Santa Clarita, California is an absolute tragedy, to be sure. We still don’t know much about what happened, much less why it happened. There are still answers to be learned.

What we do know, however, is that a 16-year-old got a gun and opened fire at Saugus High School.

Apparently, we’ve also learned that the NRA isn’t allowed to talk about much of anything after a shooting.

Today’s shooting at Saugus High School was at least the 30th to occur in an American school this year. As of right now, one person has died from injuries suffered in the shooting and at least six are suffering from injuries.

The National Rifle Association took today to discuss a matter outside of gun control and gun safety. While the Saugus shooting was occurring, the organization took to their Twitter account to brag about AR-15 sales in the last month.

At 10:30 AM EST, the NRA tweeted, “As Democrats pushed confiscation, October gun sales jumped 10%. Last month we crowned Beto ‘AR-15 salesman of the month.’ After this massive increase, we think the current Democrats still standing deserve “Gun Salespeople of the Year.”

As Democrats pushed confiscation, October gun sales jumped 10%.📈

Last month we crowned Beto “AR-15 salesman of the month.” After this massive increase, we think the current Democrats still standing deserve “Gun Salespeople of the Year.”

Read more here: https://t.co/S8b4V8PaNA pic.twitter.com/rHXhWGxXu1

— NRA (@NRA) November 14, 2019

In other words, they said something that had nothing to do with Santa Clarita. So why is this news?

It’s news because the NRA had the audacity to speak following a school shooting.

This is what the @NRA tweeted while the school shooting in Santa Clarita unfolded. https://t.co/e6CU2ouJZ8

— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) November 14, 2019

Yeah, and?

Look, no one is downplaying what happened in Santa Clarita. However, the NRA’s comment had absolutely nothing to do with Santa Clarita. Nothing at all.

For one thing, the Santa Clarita shooter apparently used a handgun, a .45 to be more specific. That’s not an AR-15, though I wouldn’t expect Shannon to know the difference. The point remains, though, that the NRA’s comment was completely irrelevant regarding Santa Clarita.

The problem, though, is that the NRA isn’t really allowed to speak after a high-profile shooting. Sure, Sen. Dick Blumenthal can act like Dick Blumen-idiot on the floor of Congress and that’s perfectly fine. The NRA makes a comment that has no bearing on that incident and you’d think they’d just openly praised the gunman.

Such is the way with anti-gunners, though, it seems.

Had the NRA said anything, Shannon Watts and company would have immediately attacked. Well, anything short of capitulation on gun control, anyway. That’s because the NRA isn’t allowed to speak after a mass shooting.

Some are calling the NRA’s comments “tacky” and “inappropriate” but there are a few matters that need to be mentioned.

For one thing, this doesn’t rise to the definition of “mass shooting” unless you’re using the one anti-gunners tend to prefer because it gives them more to complain about. With only two killed–the gunman has survived his self-inflicted gunshot wound as of this writing–it doesn’t have the death toll of four or more people killed in a single incident.

Frankly, there’s no reason to treat this as a mass shooting except that it was on a school campus.

Additionally, groups like the NRA often schedule tweets well in advance, automating their Twitter accounts. It’s entirely possible that this tweet was scheduled hours or even days ahead of time and no one thought about it since.

Regardless, though, the criticism from people like Shannon and her sycophants is hysterical. It really all boils down to their belief that the NRA shouldn’t speak after a shooting.

And, of course, since there’s always a shooting somewhere in a nation of 330 million people, they just shouldn’t speak period.

Tom Knighton is a Navy veteran, a former newspaperman, a novelist, and a blogger and lifetime shooter. He lives with his family in Southwest Georgia. https://bearingarms.com/author/tomknighton/

**Update** [Editor’s Note from Cam]

After publication, the NRA’s Amy Hunter reached out to make the point that while the NRA’s tweet was sent out at 10:30 a.m., the shooting at Saugus High School happened at 10:40 a.m. Eastern time, ten minutes after the NRA’s tweet. She’s right, and I appreciate her reaching out.

When you consider that fact, the story isn’t just that the NRA is being criticized for being insensitive after a school shooting, it’s that anti-gun activists are lying about the NRA’s tweet, pretending it was sent as the news of the shootings was breaking, instead of ten minutes before the the terrible crime, in order to try to portray the NRA in the worst light possible. Even worse, none of their allies in the media are going to point out that the NRA’s tweet came out before the shootings in California, though they’ll certainly cover the outrage stoked by the gun control advocates.

https://bearingarms.com/tom-k/2019/11/15/nra-not-allowed-talk-anything-following-shooting/