WaPo Fact-Check: ‘Verdict Pending’ on Obama Skeet Shooting Claim

The Washington Post Fact-Checker, Glenn Kessler reported that ‘a number of readers have raised questions about the president’sstatement that he goes skeet shooting “all the time.”‘ So he thought some fact checking might be in order.

He actually did a pretty thorough investigation of the last four years: “We searched high and low through hundreds of news reports to see ifthere was ever any other mention of Obama engaged in skeet shooting.”

They found 0 evidence.

They couldn’t find evidence that Obama ever tried skeet shooting before he became president, either. Not that O didn’t exploit a gullible skeet-shooting gun group to try to woo pro-gun supporters. 

During the 2008 campaign, a group that called itself the American Hunters and Shooters Association — which some pro-gun groups attacked as a front for anti-gun forces — endorsed Obamaand announced he would attend a skeet shooting event in September inColorado. “The Obama campaign says the skeet shooting event willhighlight the Democrat’s support of the Second Amendment and huntingrights,” the Associated Press reported.

But Ray Schoenke, a formerWashington Redskins football player who headed the organization, said inan interview Wednesday that in the end Obama did not attend theColorado event. Schoenke said that after Obama’s election, theorganization — which he said was intended to bridge the gap betweenurban liberals and rural gun owners — closed down because of lack ofsupport from the Obama administration. He said he did many events insupport of the Obama campaign in 2008 but Obama never mentioned havingever handled a firearm.

So Kessler was unable to find any evidence that Obama goes skeet shooting “all the time”, thus the pending verdict. He says, “we do not have enough information to make a ruling one way or the other.”

Yesterday, a source who claims to have witnessed the President’s “awkward attempts” at pinging pigeons, told Fox News that he’s only tried it a couple of times.

“The only time he shot skeet was for President’s Cup,” said thesource, referring to a shooting competition tradition involving thepresidential Marine guards. “I was there. He stayed for about fiveminutes, and couldn’t leave fast enough.”