Music Midtown Cancelled After Gun Activists Challenge Festival for Right to Carry

Music Midtown announces a sudden cancellation after gun activists challenge festival’s no guns policy.

Music Midtown is an Atlanta favorite festival that happens every September at Piedmont Park and this year was set to host performances from My Chemical Romance, Jack White, Louis the Child, Fall Out Boy, and more. However, the festival came to a screeching halt when gun activists challenged the event’s “no weapons” policy.

In 2019, the “Safe Carry Protection Act” expanded Georgia’s right to carry guns in bars, churches, schools, and other private businesses with the owner’s permission. This law also extended carry rights on publicly owned land, like the city-owned Piedmont Park.

As part of the ruling, Georgia’s Supreme Court set a standard for how the Safe Carry Protection Act would be enforced by private businesses using public land. It was decided that businesses with certain types of long-term leases for state-owned land could legally bar guns, while businesses with shorter-term leases could not.

The law did not necessarily give the city the authority to enforce the allowance of guns in the event. However, it created an opportunity for gun carriers who purchased tickets to successfully sue event organizers if they were denied entry to the festival.

As a result, this posed a huge obstacle for the organizers of Music Midtown just a month before the festival is set to happen. Unable to find a new location on short notice, Live Nation was essentially given an ultimatum of either allowing guns within festival grounds or canceling the event.

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The decision was the latter and Music Midtown posted its cancellation announcement days ago. “Hey Midtown fans — due to circumstances beyond our control, Music Midtown will no longer be taking place this year,” a statement posted on Music Midtown’s website reads. “We were looking forward to reuniting in September and hope we can all get back to enjoying the festival together again soon.”

It is still unsure when Music Midtown will or ever make its return to Piedmont Park, but it begs the question- what is the benefit to allowing guns inside a music festival?