An indoor football team in Sioux City, Iowa, reversed course Thursday night and called off a planned raffle of a semiautomatic rifle at its game Saturday.
The Sioux City Bandits were going to give away an AR-15 during a Military Appreciation Night event at its final regular-season game against a team from Rapid City, S.D. It was scheduled for 11 days after a gunman killed 19 elementary school students and two teachers at a school in Uvalde, Texas, by a teenager using an AR-15.
The killings again reignited debate over the possession and sale of military-style firearms.
As late as Wednesday night, the owner of the team said he was still planning to hold the event.
Owner J.R. Bond told the Des Moines Register that he wouldn't "cower down and backtrack because some guys in New York City and some guys in Boston, Massachusetts, think it's bad taste."
On Thursday night, after meeting with team employees, Bond changed his mind. He told the Des Moines newspaper: "It makes people uncomfortable. The Bandits have never been about controversy. We've done this in the past without any issues at all. And I guess our front office didn't think through the whole situation with Texas and everything."
One of the team's sponsors had threatened to withdraw his team's support of the team if the promotion went on as scheduled and spoke to Bond about the issue, the Register reported.
The Bandits, who play in a league called Champions Indoor Football, have done the promotion in the past and plan to bring it back in the future, the team owner said.
