Americans love their great nation. Americans also love God, guns and apple pie. Folks in Central Illinois held a big rally Sunday afternoon in support of patriotism and gun rights near downtown Bloomington. 159 people signed in at the Bloomington Center for Performing Arts as the rally began. Probably a couple of dozen more didn't sign in, along with an undercover Bloomington police officer sent to keep an eye on things.
Regina Noland worked with Diane Benjamin of BLN News to organize a rally following the passage of gun control legislation in Springfield a few days before. Guns Save Life promoted the event with our members and friends. Held in front of the Bloomington Center for Performing Arts, the rally came together after Wednesday's passage of gun control bills in the Illinois legislature. Diane Benjamin of BLN News worked with Regina Noland to organize the event starting Thursday. Guns Save Life promoted the event on our website and at our Peoria meeting.
Starting well before the 1:30 start time, people began gathering, coming from all directions. And they kept coming and coming.
Diane Benjamin asked folks to sign in so she could get a handle on the number of participants. The media has a tendency of unfavorable estimations of crowd sizes when it comes to pro-gun rallies. Towards the end of the rally, she had 159 names on the sign in sheet. No doubt some folks didn't want to sign in for privacy concerns, meaning the true number of participants closed in on 200. And sure enough, WAND estimated the crowd size at half that.
BLOOMINGTON, Ill. (WAND) – Pro-gun activists took part in a rally to defend their second amendment rights.
…The rally included about 90 people.
Lots of media came out to report on the event.
Above, Tom Davis from Cities 92.9 in Bloomington interviews Diane Benjamin.
Participants received a huge number of honks and waves from supportive passersby. A handful of passersby waved with the single-digit salute, but overwhelmingly, the never-ending honks energized the crowd to no end.
Of course, some of those present brought signs that caused plenty of chuckles.
Okay, it should be "fewer" fits, but heh. He's not quite two years old yet.
Sunday ended up a great day celebrating freedom and our love for Americana… including Americans' natural, civil and Constitutionally-protected right to keep and bear arms.
It was great fun, let's do it again.
Thanks and God Bless all those who participated, wish I could have been there!
DLM
We missed you and you missed a good time.
"Kiss my brass, snowflake." I love it and might have to borrow this one!
A big thank you to the organizers and all who showed up!
A great day with great people.
And nobody wanted to get nasty with armed people? Imagine that.
Bravo! We need more of these to let regular folks know we are here and active. It’s not just all anti-gunners in the world!
Not surprising, we got mostly supportive honks and thumbs up. In dreamland, the snowflakes think they are the majority, but we see so many real people that love the Constitution and this country. Keep the faith folks and STAY/ GET IN THE FIGHT!!! The 1776 Revolutionaries had horrible odds, but you know the remarkable story. Those that sit on their hands thinking their neighbors will fight for them will lose it all. VOTE EM OUT MARCH 20TH!