Terrorism will be coming soon to a mall near you unless the federal government amps up its support of Second Amendment rights, National Rifle Association top gun Wayne LaPierre warned Friday.
In a blustery, fear-mongering speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, LaPierre suggested that the recent onslaught of beheadings in the Middle East and terror attacks across Europe will soon arrive on our own shores — and said we won’t be able to stop them because the government has taken away everyone’s guns.
“How much longer before the horrors of Copenhagen and Paris come to the gun-free zone of the Mall of America,” he said at the right-leaning summit, referencing a reported threat last week on the Minneapolis complex.
“Or the mall in your town, wherever you live.” LaPierre added. “It’s not if, it’s when.”
“If so-called gun-free zones supposedly save lives, then why doesn’t Obama just declare Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan one big gun-free zone,” the outspoken and oft-criticized gun advocate joked.
LaPierre took aim, too, at the White House, ripping apart an errant comment earlier this month from a State Department spokeswoman who said that to fight Jihadists, the U.S. must also battle against “root causes” like poverty and unemployment.
“Have you heard about their latest?” an excited LaPierre said of the Obama administration, revving up an already enthusiastic crowd. “Jobs for jihadists.”
“Well, I’m for bullets for butchers,” he said, sending the audience into a tizzy.
Later, LaPierre struck a less severe, but just as scary, tone, saying that criminals and hackers also posed the average American with serious dangers that could only be fought against with a loaded firearm.
“When a criminal attacks, politicians aren’t there to protect you. Laws can’t protect you … you’re on your own,” he said.
“But you know what can protect you when nobody else can? When nobody else will,” he asked.
“The iron-clad will of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.”
In the end, however, LaPierre’s 20-minute address — during the busiest day of CPAC, where potential presidential candidates get to test drive campaign messages — basically amounted to one big registration drive.
“If you care you care about freedom in any of its forms, you belong in the NRA,” he said. “Where do you think America’s safest place is? … It’s in the hearts of our members.”
