Gun Laws & Legislation

Another Gun Control Claim Bites The Dust

NRA ILA Contributor
Font Size:

If it sounds like we’re repeating ourselves, it’s because we are. For the proverbial umpteenth time, Fact Checkers at a prominent newspaper have denounced a lie being told by a supporter of expanded background checks on gun sales.

Monday, the Washington Post gave Four Pinnochios to U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) for repeating a claim originated by Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety group, that there has been an average of one school shooting per week since the December 2012 crime at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

“Applying a reasonable person standard” to what should be considered a “school shooting” in the context of the Sandy Hook crime, the Post concluded that of 126 incidents on Everytown’s list, most were suicides or attempted suicides, accidents, or shootings resulting from arguments between individuals, and perhaps only 10 were crimes in which someone intended to shoot multiple people.

The Post, saying “lawmakers need to present information—especially for such a controversial topic as gun control—in a clear, responsible and accurate way,” considered Sen. Murphy’s lie particularly egregious in view of the fact that Everytown’s claims about school shootings have been so widely discredited previously. As examples, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution first rated Everytown’s claims about the number of school shootings since Sandy Hook mostly false back in June 2014. Three months later, John Lott released the result of research that found that some of the persons involved in the incidents cited by Everytown weren’t even associated with the schools and/or the incidents didn’t occur during regular school hours.

Maybe Murphy can take comfort from the fact that he’s not the only anti-gunner that has been taken to task for telling lies. In 2013, the Post rejected former Pres. Bill Clinton’s claim that half of all mass killings in the United States had occurred since the September 2004 expiration of his “ban” on “assault weapons” and “large” magazines. The newspapersaid, “the available data show that Clinton was way off base in his assertion, making an exaggerated claim—which his office would not even defend.”

The same year, the Post gave Pres. Barack Obama Three Pinnochios for repeating Everytown’s claim that 40 percent of firearms are sold without a background check. (And even if Obama had been telling the truth, it would only have been an endorsement for checkless firearm sales, given that the nation’s murder rate is at or near an all-time low.)

In December, the Journal-Constitution gave a mostly false rating to Everytown’s claim exaggerating school shootings in Georgia. In March, the Post gave Pres. Barack Obama Three Pinnochios for his “odd series of exaggerated gun claims,” including the claim that the U.S. has the world’s highest murder rate, the claim that it’s easier to buy a handgun than a vegetable, and the claim that gun control opponents want laws to allow “firearms in kindergartens and machine guns in bars.”

In April, the Richmond Times-Dispatch gave a mostly false rating to Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) for repeating the “40 percent” claim that Pres. Obama was faulted for previously, but which Everytown continues to use every chance it gets. Also in April, Everytown was caught trying to exaggerate the size of their miniscule anti-gun demonstration during the NRA Annual Meeting in Nashville.

In May, the Journal-Constitution rated as “mostly false” Everytown’s claim that weak gun laws were responsible for a gun being stolen in Georgia and later used in a crime in New York City.

And last week, the Tampa Bay Tribune rated as mostly false Obama’s recent claim comparing multiple victim shootings in the U.S. to those in other countries.

But when have the facts had any bearing on what gun control supporters say?

Check your gun laws – click here to see your state.

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel