A week after Pennsylvania governor Tom Wolf vetoed a controversial firearm bill, some area residents met in Cheswick to protest the bill Thursday.
The piece of legislation, Senate Bill 565, includes a designation to allow anyone age 18 and over to carry a loaded, concealed firearm in public without a permit, which is currently required.
Around two dozen people attended the protest organized by CeaseFirePA in Rachel Carson Park.
The bill has received plenty of backlash across the state and locally, according to Terri Minor Spencer, the CeaseFirePA Southwestern PA Campaign Organizer.
“PA Chiefs of Police, PA District Attorneys and the Allegheny County Chiefs of Police Association all oppose this bill,” Minor Spencer said. “This bill will not keep the people, that are supposed to keep us safe, even safe.”
The bill passed through the Pennsylvania General Assembly before being vetoed by Wolf last Thursday. The rally targeted Rep. Carrie Lewis DelRosso, who supported the bill.
“Representative Lewis DelRosso, and the legislatures in her camp, continue to defend the status quo and make poor decisions, while the body count keeps rising,” said Alicia Chatkin, the Board President of CeaseFire PA and constituent of Lewis DelRosso.
The group believes that, without required permits, more opportunities for mass shootings would arise.
Thaddeus Park, a gun violence survivor and military veteran, who lost his 10-year-old brother in a drive-by shooting while growing up in Philadelphia, finds the bill dangerous and ineffective.
“Our unalienable rights to life, to liberty and to the pursuit of happiness, are stripped from us every time a person is slain by a gun,” he said. “This is not a red or blue issue, a liberal or conservative issue, but an American issue.”