Student, Teachers, and Officers Preventing School Violence Act of 2018

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHNEIDER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 4909, the STOP School Violence Act.

Mr. Speaker, we have a fundamental responsibility to protect our young people from violence, and this package of school security improvements is an important step. In particular, this bill includes a bipartisan provision that I introduced with my friend and colleague from Illinois, Congressman Mike Bost, to help schools acquire and install panic buttons in classrooms for use in emergency situations.

Mr. Bost and I first introduced the Securing Our Schools Act in January, and I am proud of the support we have built from both sides of the aisle which helped get this provision included in today's school safety package.

This technology will ensure students and teachers have a more immediate method of notifying law enforcement and first responders in case of a medical emergency, active school shooter incident, or natural disaster. All congressional offices have similar emergency buttons. If this technology is good enough for Members of Congress, we should be doing the same to keep our young people safe where they learn.

While this bill represents progress, it is far from an adequate solution to the threat of gun violence. We now need to build on this bipartisan momentum for other urgent solutions to improve gun safety and reduce gun violence. This includes universal background checks; restrictions on the sale of bump stocks, assault weapons, and high- capacity magazines; and research into the causes of gun violence.

Here in this Congress, we have the ability to save lives with commonsense legislation. We must act, and I urge my colleagues to support this legislation. It is a good start.

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