Vice President Kamala Harris revealed she owns a Glock handgun and has fired it at shooting range as she doubled down on her claims she would shoot an intruder.
Harris divulged the information in an interview on CBS ’60 Minutes,’ when correspondent Bill Whitaker asked her about a matter she has addressed only in brief in other settings.
‘I have a Glock, and I’ve had it for quite some time. And – I mean, look, Bill, my background is in law enforcement, so there you go,’ she told him.
Whitaker asked Harris, a former California prosecutor who served as the state’s AG, whether she had ever fired the weapon.
‘Yes,’ she responded, laughing. ‘Of course I have. At a shooting range. Yes, of course I have.’
‘That’s not the first time I’ve talked about it,’ she told her interviewer, after he said she ‘surprised people’ with her earlier gun ownership comments.
She got asked about her gun after mentioning it in an interview with Oprah Winfrey. Harris, who had a liberal voting in the Senate and has been a strong supporter of gun control, indicated a willingness to use the weapon to defend her home.
‘If someone breaks in my house, they’re getting shot,’ she told Winfrey.
She had mentioned her gun ownership before, but many supporters were surprised to learn about it. She did not reveal more about what type of weapon she owned. She said previously she kept it for personal safety.
Harris also joked about the sensitivity of the issue almost as soon as she made the comment to Winfrey.
She said she ‘probably should not have said that,’ then quipped, ‘My staff will deal with that later.’
The Glock, manufactured in Austria and the U.S., is a favorite of many police departments and law enforcement agencies.
Her revelations come at a time when rival Donald Trump is calling Harris and Democrats a threat to Second Amendment gun rights.
Both candates are also in a fierce battle for support in states where support for gun rights, particularly in rural areas, runs strong.
That includes western and central Pennsylvania, where both Trump and Harris are battling for support.
Harris, like Biden, calls for reinstating the expired ban on assault-style weapons, a regulation that dates to the Clinton administration but lapsed.
As a senator, she cosponsored legislation to regulate ghost guns, ban large-capacity ammo clips, as well as bump stocks.
Back in 2005 when she was San Francisco DA, she backed a ballot proposition to bar city residents from buying, selling or possessing handguns. There were exceptions for active-duty law enforcement and military members.
President Joe Biden also occasionally speaks about how he owns a shotgun, even while repeatedly demanding the return of an assault weapons ban amid a wave of horrific mass shootings and school shootings.
Harris posted the interaction on 60 minutes. ‘My background is in law enforcement. Yes, I own a glock,’ she wrote.
Trump campaign official Tim Murtagh wasn’t buying it. (Trump himself has claimed Harris was lying when she said she worked at McDonald’s as a student).
‘Is there a point where even she will decide that she can’t continue the charade? When she was the San Francisco DA, she supported a proposition that banned the purchase, sale, or possession of all handguns,’ he wrote.
