CNN is reporting that Wal-Mart is going to end sales of handgun ammo and ask customers to not open carry in their stores: Walmart ends all handgun ammunition sales and asks customers not to carry guns into stores…
Walmart on Tuesday announced it will reduce its gun and ammunition sales, one month after more than 20 people were killed in a mass shooting at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas. Walmart also pressured Congress to enact gun safety measures.
The company, America’s largest retailer, said it will stop selling handgun ammunition and ammunition for short-barrel rifles after selling all of its current inventory. Walmart (WMT) will also stop selling handguns in Alaska, the only state where it still sells handguns. And Walmart will request that customers no longer openly carry guns into its 4,700 US stores, or its Sam’s Club stores, in states that allow open carry.
However, Walmart will continue to sell long barrel deer rifles and shotguns and much of the ammunition for those guns. Walmart will also continue to allow concealed carry by customers with permits in its stores.
The headline is, shocker, a bit misleading as Wal-Mart apparently still will “allow” concealed carry where legal.
The people who shop at Wal-Mart are largely the sort of people who might legally carry or support those that do. The people who clamor loudest for gun control wouldn’t be caught dead in a Wal-Mart and support the endless calls to unionize their workforce. This is a dumb move by Wal-Mart.
Compounding the idiocy:
In addition, McMillon said that he would send letters to the White House and congressional leaders that “call for action” on “common sense” gun safety measures. McMillon said Congress should debate re-authorizing the assault weapons ban and expand background checks.
Getting involved in a hot button political issue is always a bad idea. I don’t shop all that much at Wal-Mart but I do shop a lot at Sam’s Club and this decision and the push for gun control will make me reconsider that when my membership is up.
The article states that while Wal-Mart isn’t a big player in gun sales, our local stores don’t sell firearms at all as far as I can tell, they do sell a lot of ammunition and are responsible for up to 20% of the total market share of ammo. That is huge. I suspect their sales of ammo have been declining over recent years so this is a way to virtue signal on a category they are losing market share in anyway but still it is dumb. It also makes it a little harder for people to buy ammunition.
Liberals aren’t all dumb. Most of them are dumb and essentially all of them are malicious and evil, but not all of them are dumb. Every little victory to make it harder to buy firearms and ammunition chips away at the right to self-defense. Just like every little abortion regulation pushes the nation closer to banning the ghastly procedure outright, so too every time you make it harder to own firearms and ammo it chips away at the fundamental right to self-defense and thereby political self-determination.
So thanks Wal-Mart for pushing for gun control. Add that to the selling of cheap crap made overseas and you are pretty quickly shedding your reputation for being a company operating under American values.