No Prom For Alaska Teen After Semi-Automatic Rifle Picture Tweet

ANCHORAGE, AK — As many teens do, Kolton Hala peppers his social media pages with pictures of things he likes and posts about positions he agrees with, but his posts on Twitter were enough to get him barred from attending a high school prom in Anchorage, Alaska, this coming weekend.

Hala likes guns, and the photo of a semi-automatic rifle he posted on his Twitter account, followed up by a tweet about the dance, prompted a spate of complaints to the Eagle River High School resource officer that he would be a danger at Saturday’s prom.

That wasn’t the case at all, Hala, 18, maintained in an interview with The Anchorage Daily News. He thinks the school overreacted amid a fevered debate over gun control stemming from the Feb. 14 mass shooting at a Parkland, Florida, high school, one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history.

"It's a gun that I like, that's all it is," he said of the photo of a Hi-Point Model 4595, a .45 ACP semi-automatic rifle. "It wasn't directed toward anybody. I was just sharing what I like."

Hala goes by “The Burning Patriot” on Twitter and wrote on his post “2nd amendment part 2. YeeYee.” In another tweet, Hala said he would be attending the prom and that others should “try not to get offended,” but that he would set up a complaint box. He told the Anchorage Daily News the comment about prom was not an implied threat, but rather a warning that he would be wearing a tuxedo in the pattern of the American flag, which he said some people don't like.

Hala missed out on previous proms at the high school. He dropped out and earned his GED after an accident at a family gathering last year. He received severe third-degree burns to his face and upper body when he poured gasoline on a pile of logs that wouldn’t ignite — a common remedy in Alaska for stubborn campfires.

But attending prom at his former high school was important to Hala. So a childhood friend applied for a guest pass on his behalf. After the tweets, the guest pass was denied — which Hala maintains violates his due process and First Amendment rights.

Anchorage School District deputy superintendent Mark Stock told the Anchorage newspaper that taking a guest to prom isn’t a “right” and isn’t something that can be taken away. School administrators have to make judgment calls, he said, and in this case were fielding phone calls from parents who were worried about Hala’s social media posts. Some said they wouldn’t allow their children to attend prom if Hala was among the guests.

"The main priority of the principal is to keep the dance drama-free and fun," Stock told the newspaper. "It's a junior/senior prom for the current students who are enrolled at Eagle River."

The school district began reviewing its policies after the Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where a gunman armed with an AR-15 is accused of killing 17 students and staff members.

"I assume they probably thought I was going to be a school shooter, which is messed up in my opinion," Hala told the Anchorage Daily News.

Dressed in the patriotic tux he planned to wear to prom, Hala attended Monday's two-hour Anchorage school board meeting where the school’s decision denying him admission to the prom was discussed. He told Yahoo Lifestyle that although he thinks school administrators overreacted, he doesn’t plan to take any further action.

“A few students are very supportive of the story,” he said. “This is a fight for the media. I’m just trying to bring light to a bad situation.”

Here are Hala's tweets:

File photo by Keith Homan via Shutterstock