Call to violence...

A chilling National Rifle Association ad gaining traction online appears to be 'an open call to violence'

Natasha Bertrand

A National Rifle Association ad that has gained traction on social media this month urges Americans to join "freedom's safest place" as protesters and members of the "resistance" movement who oppose Donald Trump's presidency "smash windows, burn cars," and "terrorize the law-abiding."

The one-minute ad features footage of protesters and marches overlayed with commentary by the conservative media personality and NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch.

Loesch describes anti-Trump protests as "madness" and terror that "shut down interstates and airports" and warrant a heavy-handed police response.

Here's the full transcript:

"They use their media to assassinate real news. They use their schools to teach children that their president is another Hitler. They use their movie stars and singers and comedy shows and award shows to repeat their narrative over and over again. And then they use their ex-president to endorse the resistance.

"All to make them march, make them protest, make them scream racism and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia. To smash windows, burn cars, shut down interstates and airports, bully and terrorize the law-abiding — until the only option left is for the police to do their jobs and stop the madness.

"And when that happens, they'll use it as an excuse for their outrage. The only way we stop this, the only way we save our country and our freedom, is to fight this violence of lies with the clenched fist of truth. I'm the National Rifle Association of America, and I'm freedom's safest place."

The ad prompted backlash from some progressives, who called it "an open call to violence" and "barely a whisper shy of a call for full civil war."

The conservative columnist Anne Applebaum also denounced the ad, saying it called on Americans "to arm themselves to fight liberals. Violence is coming."

Loesch doubled down in a Periscope video posted on Wednesday night, saying that "the language of the left is violence" and calling "these people ... the dullest crayons in the box."

The ad's language echoes what NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre said at the Conservative Political Action Conference in February.

"Right now, we face a gathering of forces that are willing to use violence against us," he said, citing "the leftist radical plan to tax capitalism to collapse" and "the ISIS dream of a worldwide caliphate."

"A lot of people, for a lot of reasons, want to blow it all up and tear the whole thing down," LaPierre said. "The left's message is absolutely clear. They want revenge. You have to be punished. They say you are what is wrong with America and now you have to be purged."