The background checks promoted by those who support more gun control measures would not have stopped the teenager who opened fire on the Washington State high school on Friday, says Richard Feldman, president of the Independent Firearm Owners Association.
"There's no background check in the world that [would have worked] because he stole [the gun] from his father," Feldman told J.D. Hayworth and Francesca Page on "America's Forum" on
Newsmax TV Monday.
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He explained that this point "takes us back always to the first rule of firearm safety: always keep your guns secured when not in use. That certainly includes children in your family."
Jaylen Fryberg, a freshman at Marysville-Pilchuck High School, shot four fellow classmates at the Washington State high school before taking his own life on Friday.
Two of his victims have died.
Feldman says that these "horrible tragedies" are often used by the antigun lobby "to push more controls against those people who aren't misusing their guns."
He explained that while he has "mixed feelings" about allowing teachers to have firearms, that the students at the Washington State high school would "have been better off had there been someone armed to be able to stop [Fryberg] earlier."
The head of the Independent Firearm Owners Association said that the shooting is another example why turning schools into gun-free zones doesn't work.
"The people who misuse guns could care less that it's a gun-free zone," Feldman told Newsmax.
"The one thing that they know, if they're thinking about it at all, is that no one else who's paying attention to the law is going to have a gun to stop them," he explained.
"It's not gun-free to the victims," he added.
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