‘Science Journalist’ Tara Haelle: Protect Your Children, Rid Your Home of Guns

“Science Journalist” Tara Haelle used her June 20 Forbes column to advise parents that the best way to protect their children from guns is to rid the home of all firearms.

Haelle did not say how disarmed parents are to protect their children from armed home invaders and burglars, but she made clear her conviction that ridding the home of guns is the best way to keep kids safe.

Writing in Forbes, Haelle said, “What can be done to reduce the risk that your child will become a statistic?” She then wrote:

First, remove all firearms from the home. Second, if you are unable or unwilling to remove all guns from the home, store them unloaded in a locked safe with ammunition locked up elsewhere. Third, ask the household members of every home your child visits whether they have firearms in the home and, if so, whether they are safely stored as above.

Again, Haelle does not explain how children in gun-free homes will be any safer than children and teachers were in gun-free Sandy Hook Elementary on December 12, 2014, but she says “[removing] all guns from the home” is the main way to keep kids safe.

She bases her claims on a recent study published by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), which considers anyone aged 17 and under a “child.” Haelle does not mention that the study shows those most children prone to gun deaths are “African American children” aged 13-17; the prime age for gang involvement. By not covering that aspect of the study, Haelle can write as if children throughout America are facing an epidemic of gun deaths.

But she used another Forbes column to hedge her claims by saying, “19 children will die or receive emergency treatment for a gunshot wound.” Note, “die or receive… treatment.”

Basically, the figure “19 children” a day means 19 minors, aged 17 and below, will be treated for a gunshot wound and, in some cases, will die. The children at highest risk for firearm homicide deaths are black children aged 13-17; they are actually “10 times” more likely to die in a firearm homicide than “white children and Asian-American children.” Haelle did not mention these aspects of the study published by AAP.

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.