DALLAS — Former President Donald Trump is expected to address members of the National Rifle Association when the organization gathers for its annual meeting in Dallas later this month.
Trump is expected to give the keynote speech at the event on May 18 at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center downtown. The NRA annual meeting was last held at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas in 2018.
Gov. Greg Abbott is also expected to speak during the NRA leadership forum May 18.
Trump first addressed the NRA in 2015 and the meeting in Dallas will mark his ninth address to the organization.
Recently, in February, Trump told members at the NRA’s Great American Outdoors Show in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, that “no one will lay a finger on your firearms” if he returns to the White House, as the Associated Press reported.
“During my four years, nothing happened. And there was great pressure on me having to do with guns. We did nothing. We didn’t yield,” Trump said at that event, as reported by AP.
Trump has repeatedly promised to protect gun owners’ rights, despite calls from advocates for policy changes after mass shootings in recent years. In North Texas, May 6 marks one year since a gunman killed eight and wounded seven others at Allen Premium Outlets.
The NRA’s annual meeting touted as the “largest gathering of NRA members and Second Amendment supporters in the country,” includes three days of seminars, events, and an exhibit hall with 14 acres of guns and gear, according to the organization.
This year’s annual meeting comes less than a year after a New York jury found the NRA’s former longtime CEO Wayne LaPierre liable in a lawsuit alleging LaPierre misspent millions of dollars of the group’s money on pricey perks, as the Associated Press reported. LaPierre was ordered to pay nearly $4.4 million in restitution to the group in that case, the AP reports. He announced his resignation as CEO of the NRA in January days before the start of that civil trial, according to AP reports.
Trump’s own hush money trial is ongoing in New York. Trump is accused of falsifying Trump Organization business records as part of alleged efforts to suppress stories he feared could hurt his 2016 presidential campaign, as the Associated Press reports.
The allegations are centered on alleged payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal, the Associated Press reports.