Josh Abbott Band Guitarist: ‘We Need Gun Control Now’

Josh Abbott Band guitarist Caleb Keeter apologized for previously defending the Second Amendment and said the Las Vegas attack convinced him that “we need gun control now.”

Keeter said some of the band’s crew were armed during the attack — that they have concealed carry permits and keep guns near — but they could not get to their guns when the Vegas attacker opened fire.

On Monday, he wrote:

I have been a proponent of the 2nd Amendment my entire life. Until the events of last night, I cannot express how wrong I was. We actually have members of our crew with CHL licenses and legal firearms on the bus, [but] they were useless. We couldn’t touch them for fear that the police might think we were part of the massacre and shoot us. A small group (or one man) laid waste to a city with dedicated, fearless police officers desperately trying to help, because of access to an insane amount of fire power.

He said he wrote out a “living will” because he did not know if he would make it through the night, then added, “We need gun control RIGHT. NOW. My biggest regret is that I stubbornly didn’t realize it until my brothers on the road and myself were threatened by it.”

A few hours later, a Twitter follower suggested Keeter should have been for gun control sooner, and he responded, “You’re absolutely correct. I saw this happening for years and did nothing. But I’d like to do what I can now.”

Keeter did not say if part of doing what he can will include asking his crew members to quit taking guns on the bus for self-defense. After all, if he is going to campaign against Americans’ right to be armed, it will look extremely hypocritical for him to retain the prerogative to use a gun when under duress.

AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.