Melissa Joan Hart joins Martin Heinrich, other advocates to urge action on guns

Actress Melissa Joan Hart joined Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) and other advocates to rally support for his legislation that would restrict access to certain semi-automatic firearms, large-capacity magazines and related conversion devices.

Hart, most famous for her roles in TV shows like “Clarissa Explains It All” and “Sabrina the Teenage Witch,” said her political views on access to weapons changed following the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting in which 26 people were killed, including 20 children. She was then near the scene of the 2023 shooting at the The Covenant School in Nashville, where she helped fleeing children to safety.

“I used to believe that you couldn’t mess with the Second Amendment because that’s a threat to our freedom as Americans. But now I can say that we are not free as long as weapons of war are allowed in the hands of untrained, unchecked citizens,” said Hart, who has previously supported Republican candidates. “We are not free if our children are forced to practice lockdown drills at school and at church, and we are not free if we have to live in fear.”

Whitney Port, who rose to fame on “The Hills,” added: “I have a six-year-old child and the realization that my child is practicing for a mass shooting in school fills me with fear and overwhelming stress.”

Heinrich, a lifelong gun owner, has five members of the Democratic conference as co-sponsors.