FLOYD COUNTY, Va. – A call to action.
“Our intent is to gather the public, the community, together in a form of education,” Floyd County Militia Muster Call co-organizer Hunter Crawford said Thursday.
Crawford is helping organize the muster, set to take place at noon on Jan. 18 at Floyd Recreational Park.
“If we just got a group of people together to show up with as many guns as you can and just hoop and holler and do whatever, we could be construed as an extremist militia group and that’s not our intention," Crawford said. "That’s why I stress our intention is education. The muster is a way to inform people what the role of an unorganized militia is, what does it mean, what action are they allowed to do and not allowed to do.”
People were reluctant to share their reactions Thursday.
Jeff Guilliams had not previously heard about the muster call but was glad to know people in Floyd County are taking action.
“I don’t think it’s extreme. I think we have every right to question our politicians,” said Guilliams.
Others, however, call talk about a militia a knee-jerk reaction and question whether the muster call represents how everyone in Floyd County feels about what is currently going on in Richmond.
They worry about the potential fallout from a muster call and talk about militias.
“We’ve got to tell these politicians, ‘Enough’s enough.’ Quit dilly-dallying around and do what we pay you to do,” Guilliams said.
What will happen after the muster call, Crawford said, will depend on which laws pass during the General Assembly session and which don’t.