Fox host challenges NRA chief: Santa Fe 'was a hardened school'

After the gun massacre at Santa Fe High School this week, National Rifle Association president Oliver North found himself being challenged even on friendly ground.

On this week’s edition of “Fox News Sunday,” North was promoting the NRA’s philosophy of essentially turning our schools into armed fortresses, when host Chris Wallace stopped him.

“Let’s just talk about that,” Wallace said. “This school had two policeman, armed, roaming the halls. The school administrator said yesterday they considered Santa Fe a hardened school.”

“There was no way to detect a firearm being brought into the building” North said. “Lookit, you and I came through the lobby here in this building where we are sitting right now. There was a security desk there, there was a barrier for us to pass through. You can’t get on an airplane today without going through a metal detector…”

“But, I was going to say, there’s no metal detector in our building,” Wallace pointed out. “Are you suggesting there be a metal detector? I’m not saying that’s wrong, a metal detector at the entrance to every school, for millions and millions of schools?

“If you want to stop the carnage, look, you are not going to fix it by taking away the rights of law-abiding citizens,” North said. You’ve got to fix it in a way that hardens the place sufficiently that those kids are safe inside the door. If that means five metal detectors going in and out of a high school, you get five metal detectors.”

Research has shown that metal detectors are unlikely to stop mass shooters, and indeed, have been present at some school shootings. The presence of metal detectors has also been found to be detrimental to students.

But North isn’t just proposing five metal detectors in every school, he is saying schools should continue to add as many metal detectors — and as many armed guards and teachers — as it takes to prevent shootings, rather than pass any gun laws at all.

The NRA has even consistently opposed laws that would have required adults with children to lock up their guns, saying that such laws “would have rendered homeowners defenseless and given criminals a clear advantage in home invasions,” and that they would have the effect of “rendering firearms useless in self-defense situations.”

But our sad history has shown that none of the NRA’s “solutions” work, and the NRA is becoming more desperate with each passing day. November is coming, and Americans, especially young Americans, will have the chance to show that the NRA can be defeated.