More than a dozen lawmakers who oppose President Barack Obama's plan to expand background checks to all gun-buyers are to be targeted in a series of online advertising as part of a national day of action Friday.
Organizing for Action, the successor group to Obama’s campaign backers, plans to spend up to $100,000 on the campaign, and the national day of action marks the first test of the group's ability to mobilize the president's 2.2 million campaign volunteers to push for legislative change. Organizers have not disclosed which lawmakers will be included in the ads.
OFA plans to sponsor more than 100 events in 80 or more Congressional districts Friday to demand action on the issue. The group says it expects thousands of people to participate in the events, which will include vigils, letter-writing campaigns, and news conferences.
Executive director Jon Carson said the events display the strength the grassroots organization brings to support the president's agenda.
"We have voices in every corner of this country who are supporting his agenda and can make their neighbors understand where their members [of Congress] stand on these important issues,” Carson said, according to USA Today.
Obama has presented a sweeping plan to rein in gun violence, in the wake of the Dec. 14 elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn. Carson said OFA backs the entire plan, which also includes limiting ammunition magazine sizes and banning assault weapons.
Everything seems to stem from that date, Dec. 14. What if that had not happened. Why do they focus on that event? There are more senseless killings than that, every day ... what if that event had not happened? With all that is going on in the country and the world, I think our economy is of much greater importance, if something is not done about that, we are on a destructive path. Guns have been a way of life since the country was founded. I think that "progress" is more to blame for the decline in morals and moral issues than guns ever could be. Blame television and video games, blame Mom for not being home after school because she has to work. Blame moral decline, so many other areas to place blame, why blame it all on guns? The timing on that incident could not have been better, kinda makes you wonder?
