DALLAS — Vice President Mike Pence will be a keynote speaker at the National Rifle Association’s convention in Dallas this week, and unlike the rest of the convention’s events, guns will not be allowed.
The vice president will speak at the NRA Institute for Legislative Action leadership forum at the convention May 4 as part of a “powerful lineup of pro-freedom speakers,” the association announced last week.
The NRA website’s event page for the forum says “firearms and firearm accessories, knives or weapons of any kind” are banned from the forum before and during Pence’s attendance. Because the vice president will be there, the U.S. Secret Service is in charge of event security, the NRA website says.
Cameron Kasky, a survivor of the Parkland, Fla., shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, shared a screenshot of the weapons ban on Twitter, calling the NRA a “hilarious parody of itself.”
Fred Guttenberg, father of Jaime Guttenberg, who was killed in the Parkland shooting, chimed in: “I thought giving everyone a gun was to enhance safety. Am I missing something?”
The Secret Service policy banning weapons at the event is routine at settings involving presidents, vice presidents or other individuals they’re protecting. For example, guns were banned at the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
Other scheduled speakers at the forum include Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Sen. John Cornyn, Sen. Ted Cruz and NRA leaders.
“It’s an honor to have Vice President Pence address our members in Dallas,” said Chris W. Cox, executive director of the institute, the NRA’s lobbying arm. “He is a lifetime supporter of the Second Amendment, and he has a long a record of fighting to defend our freedoms.”
President Donald Trump spoke at the NRA’s convention last year in Atlanta, thanking thousands of gun enthusiasts for their support during the 2016 election, The New York Times reported. The gun rights group spent about $11 million to support Trump in the 2016 election and more than $19 million against his opponent, Hillary Clinton.
“The eight-year assault on your Second Amendment freedoms has come to a crashing end,” Trump told the crowd then. “You have a true friend and champion in the White House.”
The 2018 convention, scheduled for May 3-6 at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in downtown Dallas, drew criticism from Dallas Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway in February. Caraway said it would be inappropriate for the NRA to hold its convention in Dallas after 17 people were killed in a school shooting in Parkland on Feb. 14.
The convention is free to attend for all NRA members and their families. The annual meeting will include firearms displays and exhibits as well as meetings, luncheons and musical performances.
Attendees will be allowed to carry firearms in the convention center and in the Omni Dallas Hotel in accordance with state law, the NRA’s website states — but not during the forum Pence will attend. Firearms will not be sold on site, but ammunition sales are permitted.
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Topics: t000002953,t000397698,t000398331
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