Killer Mike defends gun ownership in NRA video

Rapper Killer Mike infuriated the left by defending gun ownership in a recent interview featuring black Second Amendment supporters on NRATV.

Killer Mike, who campaigned for Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2016 Democratic presidential primary, was the most prominent of a half-dozen black gun-rights supporters appearing in an NRA video released prior to Saturday’s anti-gun March for Our Lives.

“We are a gun-owning family,” said Killer Mike, a member of the Run the Jewels duo. “We are a family where my sister farms. We are a family where we’ll fish, we’ll hunt. But we are not a family that jumps on every single thing an ally of ours does because some stuff we just don’t agree with.”

Before the March 14 school walkout for gun control, he said, “I told my kids on the school walkout: ‘I love you. If you walk out [of] that school, walk out [of] my house.”

After being hit with a backlash on social media from critics who accused him of supporting the NRA, Killer Mike tweeted that he endorsed gun ownership but not any particular organization, adding, “That ain’t my fight.”

Where is the endorsement in that interview? I endorse gun ownership. Idc what org u join. That ain’t my fight https://t.co/Z0Gscr4ZYP

— Killer Mike (@KillerMike) March 25, 2018

The video released Thursday came as a rebuttal to the March for Our Lives, a star-studded gun-control rally held Saturday that drew a crowd of about 200,000 at the main event in Washington, D.C., according to Digital Design & Imaging Service for CBS News.

Celebrities who performed or participated in the District and Los Angeles rallies included Paul McCartney, George Clooney, Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga, Jimmy Fallon, Kim Kardashian, Kanye West, Miley Cyrus and Cher.

The protest also featured students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, site of the deadly Feb. 14 shooting, who have since become catalysts for the gun-control movement and outspoken NRA critics.

“We cannot move on. If we move on, the NRA and those against us will win,” said Stoneman Douglas student Delaney Tarr at the rally. “They want us to forget. They want our voices to be silenced.”

In the NRA video, Kevin Dixie, who runs No Other Choice Firearms Training in St. Louis, emphasized the importance of black people living in high-crime neighborhoods being able to defend themselves.

“You have millionaires, they’re sending all these kids up to a march, they’re putting on a concert for them. You’ve got artists and entertainers from around the country,” Mr. Dixie said. “Yet we can lose that many kids in a weekend, two weekends in the inner-city on a regular basis, and nobody really has that kind of effort going toward stopping it.”

Killer Mike, who received support from rapper Glasses Malone and others, relayed an anecdote about another entertainer who called him for advice after coming under pressure to make an anti-gun endorsement.

I love u, Cuz lmfao I laffed but I know it’s pure 🙏🏾💯 https://t.co/zi2TNnSRBV

— Killer Mike (@KillerMike) March 25, 2018

“I’m African-American, 54 years out of apartheid. I’m very pro Second Amendment. This is why,” said Killer Mike. “And before you say what about the children, my daughter goes to Savannah State University. There was also a shooting on that campus. I talked to my wife and daughter after that, the decision was we’re going to go to Savannah, she’s going to get a gun and train more.”

NRA spokesman Colion Noir, who hosted the video, told the Parkland students, several of whom have become national figures, that “nobody would know your names” if their school resource officer had shot the gunman right away.

He cited the example of Blaine Gaskill, the school resource officer who shot and killed a gunman last week at Great Mills High School in Lexington Park, Maryland.

“I wish a hero like Blaine had been at Marjory Douglas High School last month because your classmates would still be alive and no one would know your names,” said Mr. Noir. “Because the media would have completely and utterly ignored your story, the way they ignored his.”

Two students were shot in the Maryland attack, and one, 16-year-old Jaelynn Willey, died of her injuries, while 17 students and faculty were killed at Stoneman Douglas.

Five of the most active Parkland students were featured this week on the cover of Time magazine along with the headline, “Enough.”