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Gun rights activist Ted Nugent draws a crowd at McLennan County Republican Club lunch meeting

Posted at 12:21 PM, Mar 15, 2018
and last updated 2018-07-24 21:31:30-04

Gun rights activist Ted Nugent drew a crowd at the McLennan County Republican Club lunch monthly meeting on Thursday afternoon.

The speech called “Protecting Our Gun Liberties During Crazy Politically Correct Times" comes a month after 17 people died in a mass shooting at a Florida school and a day after students protested against gun violence.

Dozens of members of the group attended and cheered as the National Rifle Association Board member delivered his speech about protecting the right to bear arms.

"It's not a state's right. I'm an American. I can carry a gun in all 50 states, everywhere I go," Nugent enthusiastically said to the crowd.

Nugent who said he has been a sheriff's deputy in Lake County, MI for 34 years said the outcome of the mass shooting could've been different if folks could have been armed.

"In every mass slaughter instance, there were Americans who would've been armed if they were allowed to be and they would've gone to that fire. They would've engaged the slaughterer and they probably could have neutralized him or at least deter him and save lives," Nugent said.

However, a small group protesters stood outside the event advocating for stricter gun laws instead. Bill Gaventa who is a McLennan County resident, for instance would like to raise the age to buy guns to 21.

"The purpose was to say there has to be something better to answer the issues of school shootings, than have more weapons and arming teachers," Gaventa said.

Nugent doesn't believe guns are the problem, but instead current laws.

"Firepower, ballistics have nothing to do with mass slaughters. It always boils down to gun-free zones," Nugent said.

Gaventa supports having gun free zones at schools, which is a federal law.

"There something wrong when, it seems to me, when you have gun free zones to keep guns out when in fact some of the guns that have caused all of those killings could be kept out if they weren't in circulation," Gaventa said.

During the lunch meeting, Nugent also encouraged GOP members to galvanize the vote of ranchers, farmers, welders, carpenters construction workers and hardware store operators in order to win in the November elections.

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