EPA
Executive Vice President of the National Rifle Association (NRA) Wayne LaPierre.
Wayne LaPierre showed again today that he’s rarely one to shoot from the lip.
His statement in the wake of the Newtown tragedy that “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun” and that no gun regulation can help public safety is in line with what he’s said after other mass killings.
During his 21 years as the NRA’s boss, LaPierre has consistently opposed anything that might be seen as regulating guns, and has always favored the idea that putting more weapons in citizens’ hands is the best way to ensure public safety.
After the 2007 Virginia Tech shooting that killed 32 people, LaPierre said it would be pointless to regulate the number of bullets allowed in ammunition magazines.
“Whether [shooter Seung-hui Cho] carried five 10s [10-round magazines] or 10 fives, does it really make a difference? Anybody who thinks that’s the issue is kidding themselves,” he said.
He said much the same thing after the 2011 Tucson shooting that killed six and gravely wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords: “When they tell you that a government ban on certain firearms or magazines will somehow make you safer, don’t buy it, not for one second.”
And after the 1999 Columbine HS shootings in Colorado, in which 12 students and a teacher were killed, LaPierre repeated the NRA’s long-held belief that more armed citizens means better public safety.
“A lawful, properly-permitted citizen who chooses to carry a concealed firearm not only deserves that right, but is a deterrent to crime,” he proclaimed at the October 1999 NRA convention, held in Denver.
LaPierre, 64, joined the NRA as a lobbyist in 1977, and gained full power as the NRA’s executive vice president — its top staff position — in 1991.
He won the job amid a heated debate within the organization between those who felt the NRA should be more oriented toward gun safety and hunter education and those who wanted to intensively lobby Congress and state legislatures for gun owners’ rights.
Those wanting to emphasize the push for more gun rights won — and LaPierre has been their aggressive champion, building the organization into an even more formidable lobby for gun owners and manufacturers than it was before.
In a rare misstep, LaPierre in 1995 called federal law enforcement officers “jack booted government thugs” amid a feud over President Bill Clinton’s semiautomatic assault weapon ban.
The comment caused former president George H.W. Bush to tear up his NRA membership, and led LaPierre to apologize.
LaPierre earned $961,074 in salary and benefits from the organization in 2010, public records show.
Even before the shocking Newtown shootings, LaPierre predicted that the NRA’s fight for gun owners’ rights would intensify during President Obama’s second term.
Obama’s inaction on gun issues during his first four years in office was a ruse, LaPierre said at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference.
“All that first-term lip service to gun owners is part of a massive Obama conspiracy to deceive voters,” LaPierre said, accusing the president of hiding his true intentions to “destroy the Second Amendment during his second term.”
bsanderson@nypost.com
