Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) responded to 145 companies pushing for more gun laws by suggesting corporate gun control is “social signaling at the country club.”

On September 12, Breitbart News reported the GAP, Levi Strauss, Pinterest, Twitter, Yelp, and 140 other companies sent a letter to Congress asking for universal background checks and legislation allowing court orders to seize firearms.

The Hill reports that Cruz responded to the letter while attending a breakfast hosted by the Christian Science Monitor on Thursday. He said, “I don’t think it’s a positive thing to see big corporations shifting their focus from their customers and actually doing what they were created to do into trying to become political players on divisive social issues.”

Cruz observed that the corporate gun control push “is about social signaling at the country club.”

Without revealing the name of the financial institution, Cruz spoke about one bank that removed its name from a gun control push after learning more about what was really going on.

He said, “I will note with at least one of those banks that came out with one of those oh-so-brave corporate letters, when I sat down with their leadership and actually asked them about it, the people who wrote the letter didn’t know the first thing about the substance.”

Cruz said he asked the bank CEO to define/detail an “assault rifle,” and the CEO could not do it.

Cruz then referenced the September 12 letter signed by 145 companies and said, “I promise you the people signing this letter they don’t know any of the details of [the gun controls they are pushing] either.”

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.