During a Thursday night CNN Town Hall, Beto O’Rourke lauded Texas’s gun heritage before quickly adding that Texas should step up and lead the nation in a gun control conversation.

O’Rourke is the pro-gun control Democrat trying to unseat pro-Second Amendment Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX).

He said, “I want to make sure that we, the people of Texas, who have this extraordinary, proud, long tradition of responsible and safe gun ownership, for hunting, for sport, for collection, for self-defense, that we use this pride of place–and our knowledge and experience–to lead the national conversation that this country has been been waiting for.”

O’Rourke then went on to explain that conversation centers on new gun controls which he believes must be passed.

Beto O'Rourke says he "strongly" supports the Second Amendment: "We need someone who could not care less about what the NRA or the gun lobby, or another political action committee thinks. We need somebody, who will stand up for human beings, for people" #TexasTownHall pic.twitter.com/S6gpqktqKp — CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) October 19, 2018

Ironically, O’Rourke swelled the number of “gun violence” deaths by roughly 66 percent when trying to justify his gun control agenda.

He said, “Every year we lose 30,000 of our fellow Americans every year to gun violence. No developed country even comes close.” Ironically, Hillary Clinton made a similar claim during the 2016 presidential election, and Breitbart News noted then that the claim actually swells the number of deaths due to “gun violence” by 66 percent.

The way Clinton, O’Rourke, and other gun controllers do this is by combining actual firearm-related homicides–i.e., “gun violence” deaths–with suicides and accidental gun deaths.

For example, there are roughly 11,000 firearm related homicides in American each year. That figure is roughly 66 percent lower than the 30,000 to 33,000 quoted by Clinton, O’Rourke, and other gun controllers. They add on the approximate 22,000 firearm-releated suicides and roughly 500 annual accidental gun deaths, then present the whole number–30,000 to 33,000–as being due to “gun violence.” This gives the impression that our country is witnessing 30,000+ plus firearm releated homicides each year, and justifies the claim that “no developed country even comes close.”

But it is all a facade. It is an exaggeration.

Nevertheless, O’Rourke wants Texas to lead the nation in a gun control conversation, and he told Town Hall attendees that it is time for Texas to have a Senator “who could not care less about what the NRA or the gun lobby, or another political action committee thinks.”

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, 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.