NRA convention draws top GOP 2024 hopefuls after shootings

INDIANAPOLIS — Top Republican hopefuls for the 2024 presidential race vowed Friday at the National Rifle Association’s annual convention to defend the Second Amendment at all costs, suggesting that new firearms restrictions in the wake of mass shootings around the country would only hurt law-abiding gun owners. “I will be your loyal friend and fearless champion once again as the 47th president of the United States,” he told the crowd, pledging to create a new tax credit to reimburse teachers “for the full cost of a concealed-carry firearm,” as well as gun training “from highly-qualified experts.” Some of the Republican politicians speaking at the event said they were saddened by the recent shootings, but most spent more time criticizing Democrats, slamming COVID-19 restrictions and vaccines, and discussing security along the U.S.-Mexico border. Asa Hutchinson, a Trump critic who announced his 2024 campaign after news of the former president’s indictment broke, drew at least one yelled obscenity from the Trump-friendly crowd after he suggested President Joe Biden was “praying” for a rematch with Trump in 2024 and declared, “We don’t need a rerun of 2020.” Others offering video messages were former U.N. “Every significant national Republican, every Republican that’s thrown their hat in the ring to run for president, is showing up this weekend to pledge their undying loyalty to the NRA and the gun lobby,” said Democratic Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, who championed bipartisan legislation that passed last year and imposed some new federal gun restrictions after the Uvalde shooting.