From rural areas to large cities, a gun buying frenzy is sweeping the United States. There is already a lack of weapons and ammunition. A reflection of the growing anguish over the pandemic, the violence and the tense political climate.
With the sound muffler in her ear and her feet apart, Brenda Dumas points her new pistol at a cardboard target. “Shoot,” orders the instructor. The shots echo at the Boondocks Firearms shooting academy in Jackson, Mississippi, in the south of the country.
“I want to be able to protect myself,” explains the 60-year-old white woman who just bought her first gun and convinced her husband to take a course in shooting.
“I feel a little less secure because of the violence that you see on television” and with which “I disagree philosophically”, he explained to AFP.
Since the death in May of black citizen George Floyd smothered by a white police officer, the United States has been the scene of a wave of anti-racist, sometimes violent protests.
President Donald Trump denounces the chaos orchestrated by the far left and promises to restore “law and order” if he wins a second term in the November 3 elections.
