Polling Station Tells Man To Remove NRA Hat Because It’s Considered Campaigning

ATLANTA (CBS Atlanta) — A Georgia polling station told a man to take off his “NRA Instructor” hat before voting.

Bundy Cobb told WAGA-TV that the incident occurred at the Douglas County Courthouse when he went to vote last Friday. He was told while waiting in line to remove his hat because it was considered campaigning.

“It definitely is not campaigning. It is absolutely infringing on my rights to express myself,” Cobb told WAGA. “All this hat does is advertise that I’m an instructor certified by the NRA, that’s all. It doesn’t endorse any candidate or anything else.”

When questioned why Cobb was made to remove his hat, Douglas County Board of Elections supervisor Laurie Fulton stated that the NRA is associated with the Republican Party.

“NRA is not a particular candidate but the courts have found that anything that suggests associated with the NRA, in many people’s perceptions, is associated with the Republican Party,” Fulton explained to WAGA. “So in an overabundance of caution, Mr. Cobb was asked to remove the hat so that no one could interpret that we were playing an favoritism toward one party over another.”

This was also not the first time that a voter was asked to remove an NRA hat at the Douglas County polling station. Fulton told WAGA that last week a man came in wearing an NRA hat and was asked to take it off after another voter said it offended them.