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Daniel Defense: Company that made Salvador Ramos's gun slammed for 'sick' ad featuring child

Salvador Ramos purchased two rifles from Georgia-based firearms manufacturer Daniel Defense the week after his 18th birthday

The company which manufactured and sold the gun used by the Texas school shooter has sparked outrage after sharing an advertisement featuring a young child playing with a rifle just a week before 19 children and two teachers were massacred at Robb Elementary school.

Salvador Ramos purchased two rifles from Georgia-based firearms manufacturer Daniel Defense the week after his 18th birthday. One of the guns was a $1,870 Daniel Defense DDM4 Rifle, which Ramos used in his brutal rampage on Tuesday, May 24. The company is now facing a backlash after it tweeted the image of a young boy sitting on the floor holding an assault rifle while an adult points a finger toward the weapon.

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"Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it," the company wrote alongside the image, referring to a Bible proverb. The post triggered an avalanche of outrage, prompting the Daniel Defense account to set its tweets to protected.

"@DanielDefense This is a tweet from the manufacturer of the lethal AR-15. It was from 16 May 2022. This is sick. This is demented and deranged. No child should be near a weapon like that (ever) This company should be bankrupted and its sick owners put out of business," political strategist Steve Schmidt tweeted.

"Daniel Defense, the company that profited from selling ARs to the terrorist of the #TexasSchoolMassacre, also wants and advertises that you arm young children," publisher Rob Keyes added.

"Daniel Defense of Black Creek Georgia Tweeted this just before that little sh** bought their weapons & murdered 10-year-olds. This isn’t to sell a gun, the child is too young - this is to sell Gun Culture. They’ve removed the tweet & you now gotta follow them to see their Tweets," one Twitter user wrote.

"#TexasSchoolMassacre shooter appears to have purchased his Freedom Stick from Daniel Defense in Georgia just a day after they posted this prayerful tweet. I guess their inspiration worked," another chimed in.

"Eliminate immunity for gun manufacturers. Require gun owners to have liability insurance for gun ownership. Financial responsibility and penalty can cause things to change w/o challenging the 2A," someone else offered. 

The company had issued a statement following Tuesday's school shooting, writing, "Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families and community devastated by this evil act." Daniel Defense later announced that it will not attend the National Rifle Association convention in the state this week. "Daniel Defense is not attending the National Rifle Association ('NRA') meeting due to the horrifying tragedy in Uvalde, Texas where one of our products was criminally misused," the company told AFP in a statement. "We believe this week is not the appropriate time to be promoting our products in Texas at the NRA meeting." The convention will reportedly be held in Houston, Texas from May 27 to 29, the Daily Mail reported.