Buckeye Firearms Association Flips Mayors Against Illegal Guns Rally

by Jesse Hathaway

Nearly 100 liberty-minded activists from across Ohio flipped the script of a Friday, August 30 Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) rally in Columbus, expressing their disapproval of the national gun control organization's ongoing attempts to limit Ohioans' Second Amendment rights.

The rally, organized by MAIG regional director Patrick Barnacle, was attended by only one gun control supporter who was not a MAIG employee or speaker. Prior to working for MAIG, Barnacle was a Pennsylvania field organizer for President Obama's reelection campaign.

Protesters attended with the encouragement of the Buckeye Firearms Association (BFA), an Ohio-based gun rights advocacy group.

Speaker Blanche Luczyk addressed MAIG's theme for the event, criticism of U.S. Senator Rob Portman's opposition to the early 2013 Manchin-Toomey Amendment proposed for inclusion in a gun control bill from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV).

The counter-protest of the August 30 event was a result of Ohioans' growing frustration with attempts by MAIG, which is steered from New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg's office, to push expanded gun control laws in the state over the past few years.

Photographs from the rally can be viewed in the Media Trackers Ohio photostream on Flickr.

As did speakers at MAIG's "No More Names" bus tour stop in Columbus, Luczyk conceded that the new Second Amendment restrictions MAIG has proposed would have little effect on stopping the violence MAIG supposedly aims to end.

Luczyk identified herself as a gun owner, noting that she received her gun as a gift and would thus be unnoticed by the national firearm registry MAIG seeks.

BFA chairwoman Linda Walker ultimately took over the tiny MAIG rally, expressing the crowd's support for the Second Amendment.

Barnacle, Luczyk and several other MAIG volunteers quickly packed up the banner they had been holding as a backdrop, distributed a press release to the reporters present, and left as the gun control rally morphed into a Second Amendment rally.

Walker, a member of the National Rifle Assocation (NRA) board of directors, explained to Media Trackers that the obvious lack of support for Bloomberg's anti-gun agenda in Ohio was representative of a larger movement nationwide.

"People are fired up, people are concerned that the direction of our country is not the direction that our forefathers wanted it to be," Walker said.

Walker asserted that Bloomberg "can't run his own state, let alone his own city."

"To have the gall — the gall — to come to the other 49 states, and want to intermingle in our politics, especially where the Second Amendment is concerned, is appalling," she added.

In response to the efforts of MAIG and other groups, Walker said BFA is joining what many consider a new front in America's ongoing debate over restrictions to the Second Amendment.

This week, Walker plans to visit Colorado with BFA legislative directors Ken Hanson and Sean Maloney. Several Colorado state legislators face recall elections as a result of their votes for strict new gun control laws this spring.

Hanson, Maloney, and Walker hope to assist local volunteers in their efforts to unseat Colorado state senators John Morse (D-Colorado Springs) and Angela Giron (D-Pueblo).

"Combined, collectively, there will be 21 days that, between the 3 of us, that we will be there," Walker explained.

"I believe that, because Buckeye Firearms is willing to spend the money out there," she continued – while holding a $100 bill donated by an attendee of the August 30 rally, "that it should send a clear message to Ohio, particularly the anti-gun legislators that, 'Hey, if we're willing to spend $7,000 in another state, because their people stood up for their rights, can you imagine what we're gonna do in Ohio?’"

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