On Christmas Day, the NBA will be running Everytown for Gun Safety gun-control ads, featuring Golden State Warriors’s Stephen Curry, Los Angeles Clippers’s Chris Paul, New York Knicks’s Carmelo Anthony, and Chicago Bulls’s Joakim Noah.
Yahoo News reports that the players do not mention the words “gun control.” Rather, they push for an end to “gun violence” and their comments are “interspersed with those who have survived shootings and family members of those who have died in them, who share stories about how gun violence has affected their lives.”
Although the words “gun control” are not mentioned, The New York Times reports that Everytown’s “robust and controversial” gun control agenda is ever present.
Everytown’s central push is for an expansion of background checks. This is ironic when you consider that two of the families included in the NBA gun control ad had family members who were killed by gunmen who passed background checks to acquire their weapons.
For example, the ad features Richard Martinez–father of Chris Martinez—who was killed by Elliot Rodger in Santa Barbara in May 2014. The ad also features Andy Parker—father of Alison Parker—the Virginia news reporter who was killed on the air by Vester Lee Flangan in August 2015. Both Rodger and Flanagan passed background checks for their guns.
Kathleen Behrens, the NBA’s president of social responsibility and player programs, said, “We know far too many people who have been caught up in gun violence in this country. And we can do something about it.”
Behrens added, “We’re not worried about any political implications.”
Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.
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