‘I’m Carrying Right Now’: Republican Shows Off Firearm To Student Gun Control Advocates
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — A video taken by a highschool pupil exhibits an Indiana lawmaker flash a gun to college students who have been visiting the statehouse to speak to legislators about gun management.
A pupil from Burris Laboratory School in Muncie advised The Associated Press that she and 4 different college students have been on the state Capitol on Tuesday to take part in a day of advocacy with Students Demand Action, an arm of Everytown for Gun security. Alana Trissel, 17, mentioned state Rep. Jim Lucas requested the scholars what introduced them to the Capitol and started to defend gun rights.
Lucas, a Republican from Seymour, and the group then conversed exterior the elevator and one of many college students filmed the interplay, as was first reported by the Statehouse File, a pupil journalism information website at Franklin College in Franklin, Indiana.
In the video, Lucas advised the scholars that folks have to guard themselves and referenced failures of legislation enforcement to forestall mass casualties throughout college shootings in Parkland, Florida, and Uvalde, Texas,
In discussing locations the place firearms are banned, Lucas mentioned individuals aren’t “truly free” until they’ll defend themselves. A pupil off digital camera requested Lucas if he means carrying a firearm. Just over six minutes into the 10-minute video, Lucas mentioned, “I’m carrying right now,” and holds open his go well with jacket exposing a holstered handgun. It was not instantly clear what sort of gun Lucas was carrying.
“Nothing about someone carrying a gun makes me feel safe,” a pupil mentioned off digital camera after Lucas lifted his jacket.
The Associated Press couldn’t instantly attain Lucas on Wednesday and left messages together with his press secretary and at his Facebook web page. Phone numbers in public information listed together with his identify weren’t linked.
In public Facebook posts on Tuesday evening and on Wednesday, Lucas didn’t describe his actions. He mentioned the dialog “was respectful, but it was clearly facts, reason and logic vs. plain emotion.”
“I fear for, and pity those that are being indoctrinated to fear that which is their best means of self-defense,” he added in a submit Wednesday, through which he additionally linked to information articles in regards to the Parkland and Uvalde killings within the feedback part. “People are also being indoctrinated to depend on government for their ‘safety,’ even when shown that government has clearly ruled that government doesn’t have the duty to protect us.”
Trissel mentioned that the dialog took a “turn for the worst” after he confirmed the weapon. When requested by a pupil why he feels the necessity to carry a gun, Lucas mentioned “to be able to defend myself.”
Trissel disputed Lucas’ declare that the group’s argument was primarily based on emotion, and he or she mentioned she felt talked over.
“Since a state legislator had shown a weapon, I felt all the more powerless,” she mentioned. “I felt scared. I felt alone. I was timid and almost petrified with fear.”
Indiana lawmakers and their employees are allowed to hold handguns within the Capitol and on advanced grounds. A invoice launched this 12 months would prolong that proper to some statewide elected officers and their employees.
The video exhibits Lucas telling the scholars to go to a gun vary and discover ways to shoot, earlier than Trissel interrupts him and asks if he has misplaced anybody to gun violence. Lucas mentioned he has defended his household twice with a firearm and didn’t elaborate.
Lucas ultimately begins to stroll away and requested, “Anybody else have any rational concerns they’d like to address?” When the dialog started once more, he walked away.
Trissel mentioned after chatting with Lucas and different state representatives about gun management, she left the Capitol feeling unheard.
Lucas was within the information final summer time when he pleaded responsible to misdemeanor drunken driving costs after police mentioned he crashed his pickup truck by an interstate freeway guardrail and drove away. Lucas, who was first elected to the Legislature in 2012, was allowed to maintain his place; state legislation solely prohibits these with felony convictions from holding elected workplace.
Lucas is a distinguished supporter of loosening gun legal guidelines and sponsored a invoice final 12 months that established a state-funded handgun coaching program for academics.
According to a report from The Republic of Columbus, Indiana, Lucas advised college students at an occasion in 2020 that gun management legal guidelines received’t stop mass killings at colleges and that he was carrying in the meanwhile. He then requested if that scares anybody within the viewers, the report says.
He has confronted controversy a number of occasions previously for what critics referred to as racist social media posts.
