Rapper Killer Mike apologized Sunday to students marching for gun control after he appeared in an NRA video defending firearms ownership that was released shortly before the March for Our Lives.
“I’m sorry, guys,” said Killer Mike in the video post. “I’m sorry that an interview I did about a minority, black people in this country, and gun rights was used as a weapon against you guys. That was unfair to you and it was wrong, and it disparaged some very noble work you’re doing.”
The rapper, part of the Run the Jewels duo, posted the apology after receiving an outpouring of criticism on social media from gun-control advocates over his appearance on NRATV.
“We are a gun-owning family,” said Killer Mike, a member of the Run the Jewels duo, in his NRATV interview. “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.”
Prior to the March 14 National School Walkout for gun control, “I told my kids on the school walkout: ’I love you. If you walk out that school, walk out my house.”
Killer Mike, who campaigned for Sen. Bernie Sanders in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, indicated afterward that he disagreed with the timing of the NRATV video, which featured black gun-rights supporters.
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He said his interview in support of black gun ownership, filmed a week before the march, “should never have been used to contrast to your march, and I think it’s wrong.
He added, “I’m sorry that NRATV did that. I’m sorry that adults on the left and the right are choosing to use me as a lightning rod.”
The NRATV video 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, the site of the deadly Feb. 14 shooting, who have 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 NRATV 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.”
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, a 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 Gaskill 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.”
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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