INDIANAPOLIS — After last month’s mass shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio, Walmart was the first store in the country to set a new policy, asking gun owners not to open carry in their stores.
Soon, Kroger did the same thing.
Now, Aldi and Meijer are the latest companies asking you not to open carry your gun in their stores.
Local gun rights attorney Guy Relford doesn’t necessarily agree with the new policies.
“From my understanding, they’re not banning guns altogether,” he said. “But I think it sends a rather silly message, that if you simply can’t see guns, somehow we’re safer.”
Relford believes asking gun owners not to open carry won’t make a big difference.
“It doesn’t affect a lot of people that I know that carry guns regularly, including myself, because we conceal carry anyway.”
In Indiana, if you have a license to carry a handgun, you can carry either concealed or openly. Relford says it’s specifically not called a “concealed carry permit” because in Indiana, you don’t have to have the gun concealed.
However, Relford says he understands that the stores have the right to make these new policies.
“I think I would be hypocritical if I wanted to beat my chest and talk about my individual liberties and freedoms, but say a store doesn’t have the freedom to set its own policy,” he said.
At the same time, Relford said it’s also gun owners’ rights to take their business elsewhere.
(Photo: Thinkstock/sleddogtwo)
