The National Rifle Association has criticized more than a dozen companies for choosing to sever partnerships following the shooting at a Florida high school that left 17 people dead. The lobby group called such moves a “shameful display of political and civic cowardice”.
On Saturday, in similarly worded statements, the airlines Delta and United said they would end discount programs for NRA members.
The carriers joined more than a dozen businesses, including the car hire brands Hertz, Budget and Avis, the hotel chains Best Western and Wyndham Hotels and the software firms Symantec and Norton, that have ended various loyalty and discount schemes for NRA members.
In response, the NRA has taken the unusual step of attacking the businesses. In a statement, it said the companies had unfairly sought to “punish” the group’s five million members over the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school in Parkland.
“The law-abiding members of the NRA had nothing at all to do with the failure of that school’s security preparedness, the failure of America’s mental health system, the failure of the National Instant Check System or the cruel failures of both federal and local law enforcement,” the NRA said.
“Despite that, some corporations have decided to punish NRA membership in a shameful display of political and civic cowardice.”
The NRA said the departing companies would be replaced and added: “The loss of a discount will neither scare nor distract one single NRA member from our mission to stand and defend the individual freedoms that have always made America the greatest nation in the world.”
The insurer Chubb has also dropped cover for NRA Carry Guard insurance, which insures gun owners for legal and other costs if they shoot someone and claim self-defense.
The pressure group Everytown for Gun Safety, which has been pressing Chubb for months, applauded the move. Everytown, with its fellow gun control group Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, is also urging Apple, Amazon and Google to remove the NRA’s TV service from their streaming platforms.
“This wave of NRA boycotts will not stop – Americans have had enough of NRA lobbyists and their deadly agenda,” said Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. “Companies don’t want to do business with the gun lobby, and lawmakers shouldn’t either.”
The NRA has successfully deterred legislative attempts to restrict gun use following mass shootings and has absorbed backlashes in the past, such as the outcry that followed the massacre of 20 young children and six adults at Sandy Hook elementary school in Connecticut in 2012.
Some companies, such as FedEx, have refused to end relationships with the NRA. Those firms that have changed a peripheral issue such as member discounts are unlikely, by themselves, to rattle the powerful gun lobby.
However, the sustained pressure following the 14 February shooting in Florida has differed from the aftermath of previous mass shootings, catching several Republican politicians in its wake.
The state of Florida was also facing a potential boycott and backlash as well. One teenage survivor of the Florida school shooting suggested on Twitter Saturday morning that tourists stay away from the state during spring break, and he immediately received positive responses on social media.
“Let’s make a deal,” David Hogg, a Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school student who has been a major player in the #NeverAgain movement, tweeted. “DO NOT come to Florida for spring break unless gun legislation is passed.”
Donald Trump has said he backs an idea to raise the age requirement to buy an assault rifle to 21, a stance backed by the Florida governor, Rick Scott, and many of his fellow Republicans in the state legislature. The NRA opposes raising the age requirement from 18.
Trump has also called for enhanced background checks and raised the possibility of arming teachers, paying them some sort of “bonus” to carry weapons and saying: “Our schools need to be hardened, not softened up.”
On Saturday afternoon, Trump tweeted: “Armed Educators (and trusted people who work within a school) love our students and will protect them. Very smart people. Must be firearms adept & have annual training. Should get yearly bonus.”
The president predicted that if such measures were adopted “shootings will not happen again” thanks to “a big & very inexpensive deterrent”. He also said such moves would be “up to states”, but offered no further suggestion of how his policy might be adopted.
The Associated Press reported that the president told aides the Florida shooting made “no sense”. It also said the Fox News host Geraldo Rivera had advised Trump on gun policy. “The savagery of the wounds inflicted by the AR-15 shocked and distressed him,” Rivera was quoted as saying.
Student survivors of the Florida shooting have spearheaded the new push for gun control legislation. They have been met with fierce resistance from gun rights groups and purveyors of misinformation, who have falsely claimed the grieving students were actors.
Speaking at the CPAC conference held near Washington DC last week, Wayne LaPierre, the veteran chief executive of the NRA, warned that “opportunists” had used the shooting to “smear” the gun lobby group.
LaPierre warned his conservative audience that a “tidal wave of new European socialists” standing as Democrats would use a gun control agenda as part of a bid to “eradicate all individual freedoms” in the US.
The reach of the NRA beyond the issue of guns was demonstrated at CPAC when it awarded the Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire award to Ajit Pai, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, for his controversial but successful push to repeal the agency’s net neutrality rules.
“Ajit Pai is the most courageous, heroic person that I know,” said Dan Schneider, executive director of the American Conservative Union.
“He has received countless death threats. His property has been invaded by the George Soros crowd. He has a family, and his family has been abused in different ways.”
The award, a handmade flintlock rifle, has previously been bestowed upon Mike Pence, the vice-president.
Another former winner is David Clarke, a former sheriff in Milwaukee whose tenure was marked with several investigations and lawsuits over the deaths of people in custody, including a man who died of dehydration and a pregnant inmate’s newborn child.