Antigay Leaders Fear Obama's After Their Guns

A leader of the American Family Association distorts an executive order to stoke fear that the Obama administration will decide anti-LGBT activists are 'too dangerous to get guns.'

The religious right has found a way to insert LGBT issues into the gun control debate: A leader of the American Family Association fears that President Obama will confiscate antigay activists’ firearms.

Discussing the president’s 23 executive orders on gun regulation this week on an AFA radio show, Buster Wilson, general manager of the AFA’s radio affiliate, said, “Here’s what number four says, the attorney general can put who he wants to on the list of people who are too dangerous to get guns. What if he decides radio talk show hosts who don’t believe in gay marriage, they’re dangerous, so they shouldn’t get guns; what about pastors who preach against abortion and homosexuality, they’re too dangerous to get guns; that could happen.”

The order actually does nothing of the sort, People for the American Way points out in its Right Wing Watch blog. “Contrary to what Wilson said, the fourth executive action simply directs the attorney general to make sure that people who are already prohibited from owning a firearm do not do so, not to come up with any new categories,” the blog notes. The order’s wording is, “Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.”

Listen to Wilson’s broadcast and read more here.

