March For Our Rights rally set

SAGLE — Supporters of the Second Amendment are gathering on the Long Bridge for a March For Our Rights event on Saturday.

It starts at 10 a.m. Organizers are staging at the Long Bridge Bar & Grill and Northern Energy at the south end of the bridge. Parking will also be available at Sheepdog Supplies.

“All those places have kindly allowed us to use their parking lots,” said Steve Wasylko.

The event coincides with the March for Our Lives, a nationwide protest against gun violence and call for legislation reform.

Wasylko said the March For Our Rights rally’s message is twofold — restricting gun rights is not a solution to curbing gun violence and that there are already ample gun laws in place, although they their enforcement remains too lax.

Wasylko noted that the majority of mass-casualty school shootings occurred after the gun-free school zone legislation took effect in 1990. Moreover, existing laws and even credible tips to the FBI were not enough to stop the bloodshed at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.

Wasylko, a federally licensed firearms dealer and instructor, said an estimated 80,000 people a year falsely state on Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms forms that they don’t have felony or domestic violence convictions, don’t use drugs or have mental health issues that would preclude ownership of a gun.

“We, literally, prosecute less than 20 (people) a year. We’ve got laws on the books already that we should be heavily enforcing,” Wasylko said.

Although the March for Our Lives is billed as a student-led movement, Wasylko could help but notice it has the backing of deep-pocketed anti-gun groups and offers a wide array of talking points, and social media messaging.

“Basically, they’re spoon-feeding kids information to try to further the gun-control agenda,” said Wasylko, who believes the students are being used as pawns in the debate.

Wasylko, a father himself, acknowledges the desire of students to feel safer, but said that can be accomplished through increased use of armed school resource officers and teachers who are able and willing to carry firearms. A new gun law would create a false sense of security, he said.

Wasylko said the noise surrounding new gun legislation distracts from the root causes of gun violence, such as a disintegration of the family unit and mental health.

“It’s taking away from people discussing what really is the problem and what’s really the solution,” he said.

Keith Kinnaird can be reached by email at kkinnaird@bonnercountydailybee.com and follow him on Twitter @KeithDailyBee.