BELLEVUE, WA – Calling attention to the “tireless” efforts of its members and leadership in the fight to protect Second Amendment rights, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms recently announced its Grassroots Organization of the Year award for 2023 goes to the Connecticut Citizens Defense League.
Headquartered in Southbury, Conn., the CCDL is a non-partisan, grassroots organization devoted to advocating for rights affirmed by the Constitutions of the United States of America and the State of Connecticut, according to the organization’s website. The group is presently led by Holly Sullivan, who was recently elected to a position on the CCRKBA Board of Directors. The vice president is Frank Russello.
“This is such an honor,” Sullivan said upon accepting the award during the annual awards luncheon at the recent Gun Rights Policy Conference in Phoenix. “First and foremost, I want to thank the members of the executive committee. They work so hard, and they are volunteers, and I just can’t thank everyone who participates in our efforts enough.”
She referred to the more than 4,000 testimonies by CCDL members during this year’s legislative session. It underscores the CCDL’s mission statement, which says, “We are especially dedicated to protecting the unalienable right of all citizens to keep and bear arms, for the defense of both self and state, through public enlightenment and legislative action.”
“The citizens in the state of Connecticut are fed up,” she observed, “and we’re going to take our state back.”
CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb noted that CCDL members and leaders truly stepped up to the plate this year, fighting literally “behind enemy lines” in a state dominated by anti-gun politics. Such efforts, he noted, require unrelenting hard work by unpaid volunteers who often do not get the recognition they deserve.