INDIANAPOLIS (AP) – Last year it was Uvalde. Now it’s Nashville and Louisville. For the second year in a row, the National Rifle Association is holding its annual convention during days of mass shootings that have rocked the country.
The three-day meeting, beginning Friday, will include thousands of the organization’s most active members at the Indianapolis convention center and attract top Republican presidential candidates — enough to help shape the beginning of next year’s GOP primary race.
It illustrates the stark reality that such shootings have become enough of the fabric of American life that the NRA can reschedule around them. Nor do they really want to: The convention falls on the second anniversary of the mass shooting at the FedEx facility in Indianapolis that killed nine people.
The NRA called the convention “one of the most important and popular events in the country, showcasing our country’s Second Amendment leaders.” Rep. Ben Smaltz, Republican of Indiana, said that he respects the organization that brought the convention to Indianapolis for the third time in the past decade, and that he thought strong support for gun rights would be key for any Republican seeking to win the party’s presidential nomination. .
“For Republicans, the Second Amendment is very important,” said Smaltz, who was a lead sponsor last year of eliminating Indiana’s requirement for permits to carry handguns in public. “For me personally, it is important to talk about the history of our country.”
Former President Donald Trump will speak at the meeting, his first public appearance since his arrest and indictment in New York last week on felony charges stemming from payments made to porn actors during the 2016 campaign.
Secret Service protection means attendees cannot have guns at the convention.
Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, also spoke out as he is considering his own 2024 White House bid. This will be the first time the pair have addressed the same campaign event on the same day since their estrangement following the January 6, 2021, uprising at the US Capitol.
Two of Trump’s GOP critics — former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who announced a 2024 campaign after news of the former president’s indictment broke, and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, who may be launching his own White House bid — will also speak.
Offering a video message are former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, who launched her 2024 campaign in February; South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, who announced the presidential exploratory committee this week, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is seen as a top competitor for Trump although he has not jumped into the race.
The convention follows shootings at a Louisville bank that killed five people this week and at a Christian school in Nashville on March 27 that killed three 9-year-old students and three staff members.
Pain over two shooting rampages has crossed party lines. Kentucky Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear talked about having a friend killed in the Louisville shooting, while Republican Tennessee Governor Bill Lee said he had a friend killed during the Nashville school attack.
The tone of the NRA convention was as defiant as it was last year, when the group held its convention in Houston just three days after the massacre of 19 students and two teachers at an elementary school in the Texas town of Uvalde.
Further overlapping the recent tragedy, Pence and several other speakers planned to follow the NRA speech by traveling to Nashville to meet with top GOP donors who were there.
“Every Republican who matters nationally, every Republican who’s thrown their hat in the ring for president, showed up this weekend to pledge undying loyalty to the NRA and the gun lobby,” said Connecticut Democratic Senator Chris Murphy, a bipartisan champion. legislation passed last year and implemented some new federal gun restrictions after the Uvalde shooting. “Our children are being hunted and the NRA’s business model is to help hunters.”
Democratic National Committee Chairman Jamie Harrison added, “Republicans are committed to the annual pilgrimage to the NRA convention. Shameless.”
Indeed, support for gun rights among Republican voters remains higher than for voters overall. About 56% of voters in last fall’s midterm elections said they wanted to see stricter national gun laws, compared to just 28% of Republicans, according to AP VoteCast, a broad survey of voters.
About half of Republicans say gun laws should be left as they are.
Also on display Friday was the resurgence of the NRA and the major role it will play in next year’s presidential race — a fast start to 2020. At that time, the organization is trying to regroup and has seen membership and political spending decline. after serious legal and financial turmoil – including failed bankruptcy efforts, class-action lawsuits and fraud investigations.
Trump, meanwhile, has a contradictory history on guns. The NRA was a major backer of the 2016 campaign, spending some $30 million to support candidates who sometimes called for carrying their own guns and vowed to eliminate gun-free zones at schools and military bases. Trump also promised to create a national right to do so.
However, when the country reeled from a series of mass shootings, the Trump administration banned bump stocks, which were used in the 2017 attack on a country music concert in Las Vegas that killed 60 people. After the Parkland school shooting in Florida the following year, Trump called on congressional Republicans to expand background checks and proposed confiscating guns from mentally ill people.
He also proposed raising the minimum age to purchase assault rifles from 18 to 21, and suggested opening up for conversation about reviving the assault weapons ban. However, after meeting with the NRA, Trump resisted the push, instead focusing on arming teachers and making schools safer.
Gun rights advocates continue to celebrate the Supreme Court’s decision last June that says Americans have the right to carry firearms in public for self-defense. It opened the door to a wave of challenges to firearms restrictions across the country by changing the test that lower courts have long used to evaluate challenges to firearms restrictions.
Amid the upheaval following the ruling, the court has declared unconstitutional laws including federal measures designed to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and those charged with felony charges, as well as a ban on owning guns with removed serial numbers . The court also considered challenges to the state’s ban on AR-15-style semi-automatic rifles.
Trying to fight back against gun rights advocates has become a gun safety movement that has spent tens of millions of dollars on political campaigns. That includes Moms Demand Action which is among a coalition of groups that derided the presidential candidate’s speech Friday as a “cow call from the right.”
Weissert reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in New York, Alanna Durkin Richer in Boston, Arleigh Rodgers in Indianapolis and Hannah Fingerhut in Washington contributed to this report.