Colorado congresswoman Lauren Boebert lit up Twitter overnight with a fundraising video aimed at NRA types in which she appears to strut the streets of DC with her Glock on her hip.
“Even though I now live in one of the most liberal cities in America, I refuse to give up my rights, especially my Second Amendment rights,” she says. “I will carry my firearm, in DC, and in Congress.”
Let me tell you why I WILL carry my Glock to Congress.
Government does NOT get to tell me or my constituents how we are allowed to keep our families safe.
I promise to always stand strong for our 2nd Amendment rights.https://t.co/E75tYpdN4B pic.twitter.com/qg7QGenrNo
— Lauren Boebert (@laurenboebert) January 4, 2021
Boebert, who owns a gun-themed restaurant in Rifle, Colorado, has spent the past month pledging to go to work in the Capitol with her gun. In the ad, she walks a residential alley in DC talking about the city’s “skyrocketing” crime rates, one reason she needs to carry. “I walk to my office every morning by myself,” she says. “So as a five-foot-tall, 100-pound woman, I choose to protect myself legally, because I am my best security.”
As a member of Congress, Boebert is permitted to have her weapon at work. The streets of DC are another issue, though; you need a conceal-carry permit to legally walk around the city with a gun. And firearms brought in from other states need to be registered with the city. Today, DC Police Chief Robert Contee said he plans to make sure Boebert knows the laws.
“There are no exceptions in the District of Columbia,” Contee said. “We plan to reach out to the Congresswoman’s office to make sure she is aware of what the laws of the District of Columbia are…[She] will be subjected to the same penalties as anyone else.”
Has Boebert received a conceal-carry permit? MPD does not release the names of permit-holders. An email to Boebert’s office was not immediately returned.
Jane is a Chicago transplant who now calls Cleveland Park her home. Before joining Washingtonian, she wrote for Smithsonian Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times. She is a graduate of Northwestern University, where she studied journalism and opera.
