Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg was confronted during his town hall with Fox News on Monday over having an armed security detail while pushing for gun control that would affect regular people.
"How do you justify pushing for more gun control when you have an armed security detail that’s likely equipped with the same firearms and magazines that you seek to ban the common citizen from owning? Does your life matter more than mine or my families or these peoples?" Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) supporter Clarke Chitty asked to cheers and applause.
"Look. I’d probably get 40 or 50 threats every week, okay, and some of them are real. That just happens when you are the mayor of New York City or you are very wealthy, and if you are campaigning for the president of the United States, you get a lot of threats. So I have a security detail and I pay for it all myself. They are all retired police officers who are very well trained in firearms," Bloomberg said.
"Let me talk about firearms for a second. The Second Amendment gives you the right to bear arms. Nobody suggests that we're gonna change the Constitution, even if you wanted to you would be able to get it done. The Supreme Court said you can have 'reasonable restrictions.' The only restrictions which I’m in favor of is to prevent us from selling guns to people with psychiatric problems, criminals or people that are minors," he continued.
Bloomberg then falsely stated only background checks are conducted at gun stores.
"The law does not apply to guns sold over the Internet or in gun shows. Why because those two things came after the law that applies to gun stores was passed, okay? And what I tried to do is to just to get every state, because the federal government doesn’t seem to want to do it, to just check before they sell anybody a gun to make sure they are not in one of those categories where people — I think most people would agree – they should not have guns," he said.
When Bloomberg was finished with his answer, Fox News cut to commercial after protesters interrupted and started chanting and holding a banner.