NRA Blames Mass Shootings On Lack Of School Prayer

Media Matters reports:

In the wake of two mass shootings in Texas and Ohio over the weekend that left more than 30 people dead, National Rifle Association board member Ken Blackwell shared a meme that blamed gun violence on a lack of prayer in school and lack of discipline at home.

Blackwell, former Ohio secretary of state, has served on the NRA’s public affairs committee and urban affairs committee in his capacity as a board member, and he was the keynote speaker at the NRA’s National Prayer Breakfast at its 2019 annual meeting. He is also a senior fellow at anti-LGBTQ group Family Research Council.

RELATED: As longtime JMG readers will know, I’ve been reporting on Blackwell’s work with the FRC for many years. In 2014, he blamed a mass shooting in California on same-sex marriage.

In 2011, he claimed that President Obama was “giving true marriage the same ‘respect’ he showed to the body of Osama bin Laden – a hasty burial at sea after summarily being put to death.”

And in 2009, he told journalist Michelangelo Signorile that gays suffer from a “compulsion to be homosexuals.”

He added, “I’ve never had to make the choice because I’ve never had the urge to be other than a heterosexual, but if in fact I had the urge to be something else I could have in fact suppressed that urge.”