Video shows Indiana lawmaker displaying holstered gun to students
Newsy
Five students from Burris Laboratory School were at the Capitol as part of a day of advocacy with gun control proponents.
A video taken by a high school student shows an Indiana lawmaker flash a gun to students who were visiting the statehouse to talk to legislators about gun control.
A student from Burris Laboratory School in Muncie told The Associated Press that she and four other students were at the state Capitol on Tuesday to participate in a day of advocacy with Students Demand Action, an arm of Everytown for Gun safety. Alana Trissel, 17, said state Rep. Jim Lucas asked the students what brought them to the Capitol and began to defend gun rights.
Lucas, a Republican from Seymour, and the group then conversed outside the elevator and one of the students filmed the interaction, as was first reported by the Statehouse File, a student journalism news site at Franklin College in Franklin, Indiana.
In the video, Lucas told the students that people have to protect themselves and referenced failures of law enforcement to prevent mass casualties during school shootings in Parkland, Florida, and Uvalde, Texas,
In discussing places where firearms are banned, Lucas said people aren't “truly free” unless they can defend themselves. A student off camera asked Lucas if he means carrying a firearm. Just over six minutes into the 10-minute video, Lucas said, “I'm carrying right now," and holds open his suit jacket exposing a holstered handgun. It was not immediately clear what kind of gun Lucas was carrying.
