‘We know where you live.’ Armed activist protests gun bill at Virginia lawmaker’s home

A gun rights activist protested an assault weapons ban bill over the weekend by showing up at the house of the Virginia lawmaker who proposed it.

Del. Mark Levine, a Democrat from Alexandria, said Brandon Howard, head of the Right to Bear Arms Virginia group and Hopewell GOP chairman, showed up to his home with a “military-style semi-automatic shotgun and pistol,” Virginia Public Media reported.

Levine told the news outlet he called the police after he saw a protest event on Facebook. Levine said Howard posted his address on the event and read it in a Facebook video he posted.

“I hope you kissed your wife,” Howard said in the video, according to Virginia Public Media. “I hope you kissed your husband. I hope you kiss your children goodbye before you come and take mine [firearm], because that’s the last time you’d have ever kissed them in your life.”

Levine told WUSA9 he intends to press charges.

“He was not outside my home for self-defense,” Levine said. “He was not outside my home for hunting. He was not outside my home for target shooting.”

“If the law does not allow me to press charges, if the law is insufficient, well, that’s one of the advantages of being a lawmaker,” he told WUSA9. “I plan to introduce legislation to make sure anyone who comes outside our home with a gun to try to coerce us to change our views on legislation is prosecuted.”

Howard told The Washington Post that he was “there to peacefully protest.”

The bill was defeated in the General Assembly on Monday, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. It would’ve banned “possession of magazines that can hold more than 12 rounds and the sales of some types of semiautomatic rifles and pistols,” the outlet reported.

This story was originally published February 19, 2020 at 12:47 PM with the headline "‘We know where you live.’ Armed activist protests gun bill at Virginia lawmaker’s home."