NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker lit up the National Rifle Association crowd at their annual conference on Friday. Walker received numerous standing ovations from the audience and boasted about his favorable rating from the gun rights organization.
“I’m proud of my A+ rating as governor. Some on the Left might call it a Scarlet Letter but I consider it a badge of honor,” he said. “It’s about protecting the rights of law-abiding citizens to possess firearms – but it is bigger than just that. It is all about freedom – the very thing our founders spelled out in our nation’s Constitution.”
“Sometimes I think that the current occupant in the White House forgets that when the president is sworn in he takes an oath to ‘preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States,'” Walker continued. “Well Mr. President, the 2nd Amendment is part of the Constitution. You don’t get to pick and choose which part of the Constitution you support. Preserving, protecting and defending it is not optional. It’s mandatory.”
Walker told the NRA audience that his support for the right of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms goes back to his days as a state lawmaker in Wisconsin’s Assembly as well as through his tenure as a County Executive in Milwaukee County.
“Like so many people in my home state, I love to hunt – be it with my rifle, my shotgun or occasionally with my Mathews bow,” he said.
Walker explained, “Some might think that my work with the NRA is because of our strong hunting heritage in our home state, but it goes deeper than that. When I signed shall-issue concealed carry and when I signed Castle Doctrine, we did it to allow law-abiding people to defend themselves, their loved ones and their property. You see, it’s all about freedom.”
Walker, strolling about the stage with rolled up sleeves, received thunderous applause from attendees at the Nashville Music City Center as he told them, “There is a reason we take a day off to celebrate the 4th of July and not April 15th, because in America, we celebrate our independence from the government and not our dependence on it. It’s all about freedom.”
He added, “And we have a president who draws a line in the sand and then allows people to cross it – who calls ISIS the JV squad, Yemen a success story and Iran a place we can do business with.”
Walker took another hit at President Obama’s foreign policy saying, “We need a commander-in-chief who will say that radical Islamic terrorism is a threat. A leader who will affirm that Israel is indeed our ally. And a president who will look the American people in the eye and say that we will do whatever it takes to take the fight to them before they bring the fight here to American soil. It’s all about freedom.”
President Obama went after Walker recently for the Wisconsin governor’s comments on Iran, calling them “foolish.”