Mike Bloomberg’s Campaign Has Fired Up At Least One Group: The NRA and Gun Owners.
Billionaire media mogul Michael Bloomberg’s presidential run helped gun-rights groups light a fire under owners of firearms who grew somewhat complacent in the era of President Trump.
Gun groups ranging from the National Rifle Association to Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership are whipping up their members with dire warnings about a potential President Bloomberg.
A former mayor of New York City who leapfrogged to the top-tier in the Democratic presidential race, Mr. Bloomberg has a long record of challenging the Second Amendment from his get-tough policies as mayor to bankrolling a massive gun control advocacy organization.
The National Association for Gun Rights alerted its members on social media to Mr. Bloomberg’s $300 million campaign to “DESTROY the Second Amendment,” calling on them to unite and stop “his anti-gun agenda.”
“Our members are motivated by Mike Bloomberg and have been for a while,” said Dudley Brown, president of the National Association for Gun Rights. “He is a billionaire and one of his main focuses has been spending his own personal money to destroy the Second Amendment. And he has been relatively successful. All of the groups on the left rely on his money.”
The NRA recently penned an editorial detailing the former mayor’s high-dollar push to limit soda consumption through taxes and shut down coal-fired power plants, arguing he will do the same to guns.
“Bloomberg has promised to spend ‘whatever it takes’ from his $55 billion personal fortune to control you from our nation’s capital,” the NRA article warned of his self-funded run for the Oval Office.
Amy Hunter, the NRA’s director of media relations, said Mr. Bloomberg is just like the other Democratic presidential candidates pushing for “registration, confiscation and bans,” but his deep pockets make him a top enemy for legal gun owners.
“His hypocritical desire to strip all Americans of their right to self-defense while he enjoys 24/7 armed security and his willingness to spend billions to destroy the Second Amendment make him a greater threat to those who cherish their constitutional rights,” said Ms. Hunter.
Alan Korwin, a consultant with Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, said the group is convinced Mr. Bloomberg’s goal is gun confiscation.
“He reflects everything that is wrong with the mainstream Jewish population in America. He doesn’t understand why guns are important and he takes a strictly anti-gun rights view. He wants to confiscate guns,” Mr. Korwin said.