The National Rifle Association is calling out the mayor of Michigan’s largest city for his recent disparaging remarks about lawful gun owners.
In a recent news alert, the NRA chronicled how Grand Rapids Mayor David LaGrand, a first-term Democrat, recently went on a tirade against gun owners. And there’s no doubt he spoke what he really thought because he prefaced his comments with, “The NRA is going to be mad at me.”
In late February, LaGrand held a community meeting where he was expected to address community policing policies following an officer-involved shooting that is currently under investigation. Instead, he chose to lash out at lawful gun owners, of which there are hundreds of thousands in Grand Rapids and millions throughout the state of Michigan.
“I think if you got a gun, you should be ashamed of yourself,” LaGrand said. “I really do.”
To make sure nobody misunderstood him, he then repeated: “I think if you own a gun, you should be ashamed of yourself. And you should really do some self-reflection.”
He then tried to enlist the community in his shaming party. “As a community, we have to start having some shaming around gun possession,” he said.
Still not finished, LaGrand had to make his thoughts known on how, to him, guns serve no positive purpose.
“No one gardens with a gun,” he said. “No one changes a tire with a gun. What they are for is killing human beings.”
Apparently not content to be finished, comparing gun ownership, which is protected by the Second Amendment, with smoking cigarettes.
“I get that we got a Second Amendment … but you also should be ashamed if you smoke,” he said. “… just like cigarettes, I see so much more harm than benefit.”
Ultimately, as the NRA pointed out, LaGrand’s attack on gun owners was, in fact, an attack on his very own community.
“LaGrand relished saying, ‘The NRA is going to be mad at me,’ oblivious of the fact that the NRA isn’t a monolithic entity in Washington, D.C., but an organization of millions of mothers, fathers, sisters, and brothers, young and old, in every corner of this country, including in his own community,” the NRA stated in the news alert. “He was mocking them and their deep commitment to the safety and freedoms of their families and their community, first and foremost.”
Like most gun haters who say what they really believe, LaGrand met enough pressure from his comments that he later released a “clarifying” statement trying to dig his way out of his self-dug pit.
“I am fully aware that the Second Amendment and state law limit the policy options available to a municipal leader,” LaGrand said. “I cannot legislate this pain away. Therefore, my comments were not a signal of impending policy.”