Link to NPR's feed
They are not taking questions. But will be available to the press next week.
Wayne LaPierre is now talking. Expected shot at people "politicizing this". He is lamenting the fact that we dont have armed guards at schools like other things we want to protect like Banks and Office Buildings
UPDATE - Protester interrupts LaPierre - "NRA IS KILLING OUR CHILCDREN!" "THE EVIL STARTS WITH THE NRA!" as he is dragged out.
FULL TEXT OF WAYNE LaPIERRE'S STATEMENT
8:10 AM PT: UPDATE II: There will always be violent people. We are not prosecuting violent offenders enough. Violent crime is once again on the rise.
8:11 AM PT: UPDATE III: Calls out the "Ugly Truth" that the media likes to hide. There are violent video games that peddle carnage.. Mortal Kombat, Splatterhouse, etc. Even one called "Kindergarden Killers".
8:12 AM PT: UPDATE IV: Moving on to music videos and movies. References Natural Born Killers.... calls movies and videos that "fantasize about murder" the "worst pornography".
8:14 AM PT: UPDATE V: "Rather then face their own moral failures, the media chooses to demonize gun owners" .. and another protester "THE NRA HAS BLOOD ON THEIR HANDS!" ... LaPierre pauses as she is dragged out and then repeats last sentence.
8:15 AM PT: UPDATE VI: "The Media" said with a sneer... calls semi-automatic guns "machine calls" and says .223 rounds are the most powerful ammunition when these things are "factually incorrect". ...so now were parsing gun terminology?
8:16 AM PT: UPDATE VII: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." ... and no, I am not making that quote up. "Would you rather have your 911 operator bring in a good guy with a gun from a mile away or from a minute away" ... I didnt make that up either. He said it. I'm serious.
8:18 AM PT: UPDATE VIII: "When did the word gun become a bad word? When a gun is in the hand of a Secret Service agent protecting the President its not a bad word." "Why is it good when used to protect the president but BAD when it used to protect our kids?" (referencing his call to put armed guards in every school)
8:19 AM PT: UPDATE IX: "Is [the idea of a armed guard killing Adam Lanza and saving children] so abhorrent to you?" ..then brings up the teacher that was "forced" to sacrifice her life to protect her kids. "No one has the right to demand that kind of sacrifice"
8:20 AM PT: UPDATE X: "With all the foreign aid this country spends around the World, can't we afford to put an officer in every classroom?" ... yeah, he said that too.
8:22 AM PT: UPDATE XI: Calls for retired police forces and military reserves to "be deployed" into classrooms. He is calling for Congress to act TODAY to enact laws to put an armed guard in every school (he said "every classroom, but I'm hoping that was rhetorical flourish")
8:24 AM PT: UPDATE XII: This seems to be the main thrust. ARM UP AND GUARD SCHOOLS WITH GUNZ. He just compared it to how we put armed guards around military installations during WWII. ....I have nothing further to say about that.
8:26 AM PT: UPDATE XIII: The NRA is forming a "National School Shield" committee led by Asa Hutchinson to design a program to guard every school in the country with an elite trained guard with state of the art weaponry. "We must act now" ... the NRA will be fully funding the budget for this initiative.
8:28 AM PT: UPDATE XIV: Asa Hutchinson is now speaking to describe the details of the plan. ...this is going to annoy me since he is going to use the 2-syllable word "Skew-all" a million times now.
8:30 AM PT: UPDATE XV: This will be a model template that every school can tweak and tailor its own safety strategy in how to best deploy its "armed trained qualified school security personnel".
8:32 AM PT: UPDATE XVI: "There are millions of retired law enforcement, retired military and other concerned volunteers would be happy to serve as protectors if asked." ...so this now sounds like a version of the MinuteMan Border Protection craziness, only around more children.
8:34 AM PT: FINAL: Conference is over. "NO QUESTIONS NOW." .. will talk to anyone about this plan starting next week. Full text of Wayne LaPierre's speech will be available at NRA.org