Gun Control Lobbyist Group Says NRA ‘Overtaken by Lobbyists’

Gabby Giffords’ Americans for Responsible Solutions (ARS) – a group that lobbies for gun control at the state and federal level – has a released a poll claiming the NRA has been “overtaken by lobbyists.”

This year alone ARS is lobbying against suppressor deregulation, against repealing the gun ban for military veterans, and against national reciprocity for concealed carry permit holders. Yet Politico reports that an ARS poll claims the NRA is under the control of lobbyists.

Politico reported the poll, saying, 67 percent of gun owners believe the NRA has been “overtaken by lobbyists and the interests of gun manufacturers and lost its original purpose and mission.”  Forty-three percent of the poll’s respondents voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 and 74 percent of respondents said they are not members of the NRA.

Giffords’ husband and gun control group co-founder, Mark Kelly, released a statement with the poll, saying:

As a lifelong gun owner, I’ll be the first to say gun owners want our leaders to do more to save lives and make our communities safer. Whether you are a Republican gun owner, a Democrat gun owner, or an NRA member — we can all agree that when guns end up in the wrong hands the results are devastating. It’s unacceptable that every day 91 Americans are killed by a gun. We’ve got to do better.

Kelly’s claim that “91 Americans are killed by a gun” every day is reminiscent of similar claims made by Clinton and her supporters during the 2016 presidential campaign. Then, as now, the claim requires gun control proponents to swell the actual number of firearm-related homicides by 66 percent. In reality, firearm-related homicides hover around 10,500 to 11,500 a year, and a tenth of those occur in the inner-cities of Chicago and Baltimore alone. Gun controllers like Kelly and Clinton swell that number by adding in firearm-related suicides–which average around 20,000 to 22,000 a year–then reporting the total number as if they were all homicides.

The poll released by ARS was conducted by Public Policy Polling.

AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.