The NRA put out a tweet to members urging them to “steer clear” of Ellen’s restaurant because of the business’s expressed support of “reasonable” gun regulations.
Ellen’s made their support known via text printed at the bottom of their receipts:
The receipt was issued at the time that the NRA was holding their Annual Meetings in Dallas. The NRA responded by calling on its members to “steer clear” of Ellen’s while in town:
The backlash from NRA members and others in the pro-Second Amendment community was immediate, and Ellen’s used a Facebook post to suggest they actually support the Second Amendment:
Early this morning, we began posting a message on the bottom of our receipts stating that Ellen’s intends to donate a portion of our proceeds this week toward the efforts of finding common ground and compromise in the fight to eliminate needless gun violence, especially in our schools and against our dedicated police officers.
With a limited number of characters available for that message, we simplified it to say we support “reasonable and effective gun regulations” toward that end.
What was not expected was that those two words — reasonable and effective — would be misinterpreted as our support for gun control. The mistake was an honest one. The opposite is true.
We support the Constitution, including the 2nd Amendment, 100%. And like the NRA, we also support finding solutions to the senseless killings that happen much too frequently. We believe those two things are completely compatible.
They added, “No one wants children to die in their classrooms. No one wants police to be killed in the line of duty. The differences we have are in our approach. But we can fix it if we breathe, calm down, and listen to one another. As Americans, that’s what we are supposed to do.”
Ellen’s then reworded the text on their receipts:
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.