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Harris aims to renew permit

After getting death threats as secretary of state in the 2000 election, she got a concealed weapons permit.

By ANITA KUMAR and BRIDGET HALL GRUMET
Published May 12, 2006

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senate candidate Katherine Harris will spend the weekend in the Tampa Bay area where she will take a required class to reinstate a lapsed concealed weapons permit.

Harris, a congresswoman from Longboat Key, received threats when she was secretary of state during the bitter presidential recount in 2000. The threats were investigated by the FBI, and Harris said Thursday they have stopped.

"For me, I just want to have a permit in an overabundance of caution," she said. "I want to go ahead with getting it for practical purposes."

Bill Bunting, the Pasco County Republican leader and the course instructor, said he has been encouraging Harris for months to take the class.

"During the first Bush (presidential) election, people forget how quickly she had all those death threats on her life," Bunting said. "You never know if there's a nut out there."

Harris, who spends her weeks in Washington and weekends campaigning around Florida to defeat Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, said she has been trying to get the class on her schedule for a long time.

The visit to the gun range will double as a photo op, with media invited to broadcast images of Harris that could play well with gun rights advocates.

After the Saturday morning class, Harris will attend the Florida Federation of Women luncheon in Citrus County and drop the flag at an auto race in Bradenton.

The NRA-designed course, titled "First Steps in Pistol Orientation," includes two hours of instruction on gun laws and firearm safety. The group then goes for target practice at the 93-acre Hallelujahland Ranch in central Pasco, owned by James F. Griffin III, a member of the local Republican Executive Committee.

Upon passing the class and submitting an application, fingerprint card and photograph, a person can obtain the permit. If the applicant has ever faced criminal charges, he or she must send documentation of those charges with the permit application.

About 375,000 people have concealed weapons permits in Florida, according to the state Department of Agriculture.

That includes a number of public officials, including state Rep. Ken Littlefield, R-Zephyrhills, state Agriculture and Consumer Services Commissioner Charles Bronson and Hillsborough County Commissioner Ronda Storms. Some of them have taken a class with Bunting.

At least three members of the Florida congressional delegation have concealed weapons permits: U.S. Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, R-Crystal River, and Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart and Lincoln Diaz-Balart, both Republicans from Miami.

Brown-Waite got a permit after an incident in which the then state senator awoke to several young men rocking her car while she was pulled into a parking lot in Chiefland around midnight on a drive to Tallahassee.

The National Rifle Association gave Harris an "A" ranking in 2002 and 2004 based on a candidate questionnaire, voting record and public statements. The group expects to give her a similar rating this year.

Concealed weapons are forbidden in Washington, D.C., but Harris has supported repealing that ban.

"Katherine Harris has been steadfast in her support for Second Amendment issues," said Chris W. Cox, chief lobbyist for the NRA. "Every law-abiding person in the state has a right to a concealed weapon. Katherine Harris is exercising that right."

A fourth-generation Floridian, Harris is the granddaughter of Ben Hill Griffin Jr., the late citrus and cattle magnate whose name graces the University of Florida football stadium. Family hunts on the weekends and Thanksgiving include her husband, Anders Ebbeson, who she said is an "amazing hunter and great shot."

Harris said she is considered an expert marksman and owns rifles, shotguns and pistols.

"I've always hunted," she said. "If I you grow up in central Florida, old Florida as I call it, everybody hunts and fishes. Everybody in the area, we would all go out hunting. ... You'd eat what you kill."

Times researcher Angie Drobnic Holan contributed to this report.

[Last modified May 12, 2006, 00:55:11]