Beto O’Rourke all over the map on AR-15s, campaign ‘quietly’ shifts position on website, AGAIN

Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke is shamelessly exploiting the deaths of 19 elementary school children in Uvalde, Texas, along with two adults, to jumpstart his run for governor in the state — having lost a White House bid and a run for the U.S. Senate, O’Rourke has struggled to gain traction and is likely on track to score a trifecta of defeat.

The Democrat pulled off quite the political stunt on Wednesday as he interrupted a somber press conference Gov. Greg Abbott was holding on the senseless shooting in a push for gun control laws. and the media, beginning with the New York Times, ate it up.

Turns out, O’Rourke has been all over the map on the issue. His campaign has even “quietly” edited his website’s section on “gun safety,” changing a call to “reduce” the number of AR-15s into a declaration that no civilian should own the weapon, Fox News reported.

O’Rourke infamously declared in 2019 during a presidential primary debate, “Hell yes, we’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47,” adding later in an interview on CNN that for those who resist, “that weapon will be taken from them.”

But he backed completely away from that stance in his bid to run for governor of the Lone Star state. In fact, he actually talked about defending the Second Amendment, which goes to show just how slippery and untrustworthy politicians can be.

“I’m not interested in taking anything from anyone,” O’Rourke said in February, during a campaign stop in Tyler. “What I want to make sure that we do is defend the Second Amendment.”

His 2019 call to “take” AR-15s — which O’Rourke has erroneously called  “weapons of war” — away from Americans came after a similar comment about supporting the right to own a gun.

“We support the Second Amendment, if you own a gun keep that gun,” O’Rourke said in 2018, according to Fox News. “No one wants to take it away from you, at least I don’t.”

And while he is singing a whole other tune today, just last month O’Rourke’s campaign website only talked about reducing the number of AR-15s — that position would be dramatically altered sometime later.

More from Fox News:

The Internet Archives’ Wayback Machine shows that as recently as April 1, the “Gun safety” page included a section that said: “And while it might not be the easy or politically safe thing to say, I strongly believe that we need to reduce the number of AR-15’s and AK-47’s on our streets.”

Sometime since April 1 (the most recent date archived), the campaign edited the section to say: “And while it might not be the easy or politically safe thing to say, I don’t believe any civilian should own an AR-15 or AK-47.”

 

O’Rourke continues to campaign on the deaths of the children, announcing Thursday that he will attend a rally “against gun violence” outside the National Rifle Association’s convention in Houston on Friday.

He tweeted, “Action is the antidote to despair,” and shared the following video trying to spur a wave of like-minded gun grabbers:

Tom Tillison

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