NASCAR’s Childress to help provide ammunition to Ukraine
Richard Childress owner of Richard Childress Racing talks to Kevin Harvick, driver of the #4 Jimmy John’s Ford, during practice for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on March 2, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Robert Laberge/Getty Images)
GREENSBORO, N.C. (WGHP) – NASCAR owner Richard Childress is turning his horsepower toward helping Ukrainians fight off the Russian invasion of their homeland.
Childress, a former NASCAR driver, is owner of Richard Childress Racing, which features his grandson Austin Dillon and Tyler Reddick. Dale Earnhardt drove for Childress’ racing team until his death at Daytona in 2001.
What you may not know is that Childress, a gun rights activist, is a board member of a company called Ammo Incorporated, which is the parent of GunBroker.com, billed as the largest online marketplace for the firearms industry. Ammo’s corporate headquarters are in Scottsdale, Arizona, and it has a manufacturing facility in Wisconsin. Former NASCAR driver Rusty Wallace also is on its board.
Childress appeared Wednesday on the Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” to discuss Ammo’s plan to donate 1 million rounds of ammunition to the Ukrainian armed forces to fight off the unprovoked invasion of Russian troops.
“I was listening the other day and heard President (Volodymyr) Zelenskyy say he didn’t want out, that he wanted ammunition,” Childress said in the interview.
Ukrainians have been seen repeatedly on news reports standing in the streets and taking up arms in any way possible to fight back the attempted takeover of their nation.
Childress said he called his friend Fred Wagenhals, chairman of Ammo, and said, “Fred, we got to help these people.”
“He stepped right up and said he would do it. Now we are turning our production to this as our No. 1 priority,” Childress said. “We are going to get that ammunition as quick as we can to them. We are working with government agencies. To get it there quickly, we are working through a private company.”
He said the Ukrainians need what he called “7.62s,” which is a specific caliber bullet that fits in Russian SKS and AK-47s along with some light machine guns.
“This is a wake-up call for America and why we have our Second Amendment,” he said. “We have 82 million gun owners in America, and to see the people in Ukraine fighting, it’s terrible to see the lives being lost over there.”
“We have to do all we can,” he added.
