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Walmart’s Loss Is Local Gun Dealers’ Gain, Gun Show Participants Say

September 8, 2019

A gun shop owner in Auburn, Maine said he is “ecstatic” about Walmart’s decision to stop selling ammunition for handguns.

The gun shop owner made the comment to a reporter from the Bangor Daily News during the 42nd annual Bangor Gun Show, which did brisk business on Saturday, September 7, thanks in part to rain.

A Walmart store is up the road from his shop, he said, and he figures more gun owners will start coming in.

Walmart announced on Tuesday, September 3 that it plans to stop selling handgun ammunition and certain types of ammunition for short-barrel rifles in the wake of recent mass-shootings, including one at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas on August 3.

The gun show’s organizer called Walmart’s decision “a ‘feel-good’ thing” that is also “a totally meaningless gesture” that won’t do anything to stop mass-shootings, according to the Bangor Daily News.

The Bangor Gun Show is managed by the Penobscot County Conservation Association, which took it over after the Bangor Daily News stopped running it in 1994, according to the Bangor Daily News.

All modern firearms for sale at the gun show are sold only to people who have passed a National Criminal Background Check, the gun show’s organizer said, according to the Bangor Daily News.

The gun show is scheduled for Saturday, September 7 and Sunday, September 8.


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