For years, advocates of stricter gun laws have rallied at the barricades of the National Rifle Association’s annual meeting. But this year, as the gun lobby convenes in Indianapolis, there’s a new posse in town. They’re mothers, they’re survivors of gun violence, and some of them are both. And they’re dead set on disarming the NRA of its outsize political power.
They operate as Everytown for Gun Safety, a new organization combining the grassroots group Moms Demand Action, launched after the Sandy Hook massacre, and Michael Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns. At a press conference in a packed downtown hotel conference room on Friday, the group unveiled a forceful new report and political ad.
“We are in Indianapolis to send the NRA leadership a message,” said Shannon Watts, the 43-year-old mother of five who founded Moms Demand Action. Americans can no longer abide by “a Washington lobby run by extremists,” she said.
“Not Your Grandparents’ NRA,” a heavily annotated 21-page report, makes the case that there’s a schism within the nation’s biggest firearms group. “Today’s NRA has remained true to its roots in some important ways,” it begins. “The organization’s gun safety and marksmanship programs remain useful contributions to the shooting […]