It is perhaps not surprising that Washington, D.C., Mayor Vincent Gray was off target in overreacting as he did to the NSSF billboard in his city advertising the return of our First Shots program to the metro region. “To promote the use of guns in the city I think really is just anti-safety,” the mayor was quoted as saying. “I think it’s offensive . . . we work very hard to be able to enforce our gun-control laws.”
Safety and proper handling of firearms is at the heart of the First Shots program, of course. Our First Shots classes are quickly filling up, proving that the people are best equipped to make their own decisions about firearms.
As for Mayor Gray, it seems he has a problem with both the First and Second Amendment. We have a suggested summer reading list for the Mayor: The Bill of Rights and the U.S. Supreme Court’s Heller decision, in which the court held that the Second Amendment applies to Washington residents, too.