Skip to footer

NRA chooses to skip Obama town-hall meeting on gun control

The National Rifle Association was missing from a presidential town hall meeting about gun control. The group took several knocks from the President as he discussed his new executive actions on gun control.

|
Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
US President Obama participates in a live town hall event on reducing gun violence hosted by CNN’s Anderson Cooper (r.) at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., Thursday.

When President Obama gathered with voters at George Mason University to field questions and concerns about new gun control policies, one key stakeholder was noticeably absent: the National Rifle Association.

Thursday evening's prime-time town hall meeting was located in Fairfax, Va., which is also home to the NRA headquarters. President Obama delivered stinging blows to the group as he fielded questions from gun control supporters and opponents and blamed the lobby group for creating a false narrative over gun control. The president pointed to their absence during the meeting. 

"Since this is the main reason they exist, you'd think that they'd be prepared to have a debate with the president," Obama told moderator Anderson Cooper.

NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam had said before the event that the NRA would not be participating in “a public relations spectacle orchestrated by the White House.”

The White House has portrayed the NRA, the nation’s largest gun group, as possessing too much influence in American politics – preventing bipartisan gun control laws from being passed, despite public approval from Americans. This portrayal is likely an example of President Obama’s pledge to “politicize” the issue of gun control to effect change.

Several NRA members were in the audience of the town hall meeting and the group's officials responded to the President’s answers via Twitter.

Other gun lobby groups, like the American Firearms Retailers Association, were present at the town hall meeting and participated in the discussion. They were joined by a string of high-profile figures in the gun control debate. Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) of Arizona, who was shot in 2011, was present as was her husband Mark Kelly. Cleo Pendleton, whose daughter was killed in Chicago, asked a question about gun trafficking. And Taya Kyle, the late wife of Chris Kyle, whose actions were depicted in the film, “American Sniper,” voiced concerns over tighter gun control protecting Americans. 

The town hall meeting followed new executive actions that tightened gun control by clarifying how firearms sellers are classified, requiring a license and background checks to be preformed on potential buyers.

This report includes material from The Associated Press.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to NRA chooses to skip Obama town-hall meeting on gun control
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2016/0108/NRA-chooses-to-skip-Obama-town-hall-meeting-on-gun-control
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe