Survivors of a Feb. 14 mass shooting at a Florida high school are hoping to expand the reach of their gun control movement by seeking a boycott of companies doing business with the National Rifle Association (NRA) and urging tourists to boycott the Sunshine State.
As the (#)BoycottNRA movement grew on Twitter, with petitions circulating against companies that offer discounts to NRA members, a growing number of those businesses announced they are cutting or reducing ties with the association.
Delta Air Lines and UnitedAirlines on Saturday said that they would no longer offer discounted airfares to NRA members to attend their annual meetings, and both have asked the gun rights group to remove any references to their companies from the NRA Web site.
Rental-car company Hertz said it would no longer offer a discount program to NRA members and First National Bank of Omaha, one of the nation’s largest privately held banks, said it will not renew a co-branded Visa credit card it has with the NRA.
In an e-mail on Saturday, the NRA called the companies’ actions “a shameful display of political and civic cowardice” and said the loss of corporate discounts and other perks “will neither scare nor distract” NRA members.
“In time, these brands will be replaced by others who recognize that patriotism and determined commitment to Constitutional freedoms are characteristics of a marketplace they very much want to serve,” the NRA statement said.
The state of Florida also was facing some backlash. One of the survivors of the school shooting on Saturday suggested on Twitter that tourists stay away from the state. He got an immediate response.
“Let’s make a deal,” tweeted David Hogg, a Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student who has been a major player in the (#)neveragain movement. “DO NOT come to Florida for spring break unless gun legislation is passed.”
Wendy Glaab, 60, of Fonthill, Ontario, Canada, was among the first to respond.
“I like many Canadians travel to Florida from time to time to escape our winter. I can’t speak for others but I will not be returning until meaningful gun control legislation is in place,” she wrote.
The swiftness of the corporate reaction against the NRA has differed from that of past school shootings, and the killing of 58 people in Las Vegas last fall, said Bob Spitzer, a political scientist at SUNY Cortland and a specialist on gun politics.
Spitzer said the reaction was likely a reaction to the student mobilization that followed the Florida shooting, but he said it was too soon tell how significantly it will sway the country’s wider gun debate.
Florida Governor Rick Scott on Friday announced plans to put more armed guards in schools and to make it harder for young adults and some with mental illness to buy guns.
In related news, dozens of US college and universities are telling students who may face discipline at their high schools for participating in gun control demonstrations to relax: It will not affect their chances of getting into their schools.
Nearly 50 schools, including Yale, Dartmouth and University of California, Los Angeles, have taken to social media to reassure the students. Several applauded the teenagers’ activism.
The Feb. 14 shooting that left 17 people dead has sparked calls for walkouts, sit-ins and other actions on school campuses across the US.
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