INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Video shot by a high school student shows an Indiana lawmaker firing a gun at students who were visiting the statehouse to speak with lawmakers about gun control.
A student at Burris Laboratory School in Muncie told The Associated Press that she and four other students were at the state Capitol on Tuesday to participate in a day of advocacy with Students Demand Action, part of Everytown for Gun safety. Alana Trissell, 17, said state Rep. Jim Lucas asked the students what brought them to the Capitol and started advocating for gun rights.
Lucas, a Seymour Republican, and the group then chatted outside the elevator, and one of the students filmed the interaction, as first reported by Statehouse filestudent news site at Franklin College in Franklin, Indiana.
In the video, Lucas told students that people need to protect themselves and referenced the failures of law enforcement to prevent mass casualties during school hours shootings in Parkland, Florida, and Uvalde, Texas,
In discussing places where firearms are banned, Lucas said people aren’t “truly free” unless they can protect themselves. A student off-camera asked Lucas if he meant to carry a firearm. Just over six minutes into the 10-minute video, Lucas said, “I’m carrying right now,” and opened his jacket, revealing a holstered gun. It was not clear what kind of gun Lucas was carrying.
“Nothing about someone carrying a gun makes me feel safe,” a student said off camera after Lucas held up his jacket.
The Associated Press could not immediately reach Lucas on Wednesday and left messages with his press secretary and on his Facebook page. The phone numbers in the public records listed under his name are not linked.
In public places Facebook posts on Tuesday night and Wednesday, Lucas did not describe his actions. He said the conversation “was respectful, but it was clearly facts, reason and logic versus simple emotion.”
“I fear and pity those who are indoctrinated to fear what is their best means of self-defense,” he added in post wednesday, in which he also linked to news articles about the Parkland and Uvalde murders in the comments section. “People are also being indoctrinated to depend on the government for their ‘safety’, even when the government is shown to have clearly ruled that the government has no duty to protect us.”
Trissell said the conversation “took a turn for the worst” after he displayed the weapon. When asked by a student why he felt the need to carry a gun, Lucas said “so I can protect myself.”
Trissell disputed Lucas’ claim that the group’s argument was based on emotion, and said she felt shortchanged.
“Ever since a state legislator showed a gun, I felt even more powerless,” she said. “I felt scared. I felt alone. I was timid and almost petrified with fear.”
Indiana lawmakers and their staff are allowed to carry handguns in the Capitol and in complex locations. A bill introduced this year would expand that right for some elected officials across the country and their staff.
The video shows Lucas telling the students to go to a range and learn to shoot before Trissell interrupts to ask him if he’s lost anyone to gun violence. Lucas said he defended his family twice with a firearm and did not elaborate.
Eventually, Lucas began to walk away and asked, “Does anyone else have any rational concerns they’d like to address?” When the conversation started again, he walked away.
Trissell said that after speaking with Lucas and other state representatives about gun control, she left the Capitol feeling unheard.
Lucas was in the news last summer when he pleaded guilty on drunken driving charges after police said he crashed his pickup truck into an interstate guardrail and drove off. Lucas, who was first elected to the Legislature in 2012, was allowed to keep his post; state law only bars people with felony convictions from holding elected office.
Lucas is a prominent supporter of loosening gun laws and last year sponsored a bill that would establish a state-funded program to train teachers with guns.
According to a report from The Republic of Columbus, Indiana, Lucas told students at an event in 2020 that gun control laws will not prevent mass killings in schools and that he is currently carrying. He then asked if that scared anyone in the audience, the report said.
He has faced controversy several times in the past for what critics called the social media posts racist.
