Gun Control Measures

Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Michigan and those who have joined together on the Democratic side to speak out on the issue of gun safety this afternoon and this evening.

I guess one of the real blessings in life is to have a grandchild, and I have got six really good ones. One is a little girl who has just entered the third grade in a public school in Brooklyn, NY. She is a sweetheart, and I love her to pieces.

She came home to tell her mom and dad last year, when she was in the second grade, that they just had a drill in her classroom, and they told her what to do if someone showed up in the hallway or outside with a gun: hide under the desk, stay away from the windows.

To think that little 7-year-old girl had to receive that kind of warning in America today breaks my heart. Why?

Does anyone really honestly believe that when the Second Amendment to the Constitution was written they envisioned the fear that would go through the minds of children who, after Connecticut, worry that some shooter will come in with a semiautomatic weapon and kill dozens of kids in one moment? That is the reality of gun violence today. That is one of the realities, and it is one that just breaks my heart as a father and grandfather.

Over the past few weeks, our Nation has been rocked by mass shootings in El Paso, Dayton, and Odessa, TX, that left 38 victims dead and dozens more injured.

According to the Gun Violence Archive, so far this year there have been 300 mass shootings. That means shootings where more than four people were shot in one event. This is in addition to the daily toll of gun homicides, suicides, and accidents that kill nearly 40,000 Americans a year.

Every week, I see the grim statistics of people killed and wounded by gunfire in my home State of Illinois. Just this past weekend--just this past weekend, in Chicago, at least 8 people were killed and 19 more injured by gunfire.

Gun violence is an epidemic in America. It affects communities large and small. I have met countless people who have lost loved ones or who have been traumatized by gun violence.

Millions of Americans now live in fear that when they send their kids--or grandkids--off to school, when they go to a movie theater, a concert, or to church, or even when they sit on their front porch, they could be shot. This is unacceptable. America is better than this.

There are many people in this great Nation who are doing all they can to try to reduce the epidemic of shootings--parents, community leaders, teachers, faith leaders, law enforcement, the medical community, and public officials, but what are we doing in the U.S. Senate? The answer is nothing--nothing.

There is no single reform that can prevent every shooting, but we know there are big gaps in our gun laws that make it easy for felons, abusers, and mentally unstable people to get their hands on guns. Closing these gaps and loopholes in our background checks system would significantly reduce shootings and save lives.

It is estimated that 22 percent of gun sales nationwide currently occur without a background check. Now, I know the critics say: Oh, great, Senator. You are going to have better background checks. Let me tell you, the people who want these guns are not going to go through that process. It turns out that, last year, 100,000 of them were ignorant enough to try, and they were caught in the act. They had been disqualified from purchasing a firearm under Federal law, and yet they made that try. Why would we ever let them successfully buy a firearm? Without a real background check, they will.

Gun show and internet loopholes are the problems that haunt us today. They enable unlicensed sellers to make sales without even checking on the background of the buyer. According to news reports, the gunman in the Odessa, TX, mass shooting bought his gun through a private sale with no background check because he previously failed a check. Clearly, there is a gap in the law that needs to be closed.

Polling consistently shows that 90 percent of Americans support closing these gaps in the background check system. How many other issues do 90 percent of Americans agree on, to have that kind of number, for Democrats, Republicans, and Independents?

The people of America are trying to tell the Senators to do something, and yet Senator McConnell refuses. Even the conservative Republican Lieutenant Governor of Texas, Dan Patrick, has called for closing these gaps in the background check system. I hope the Senators from Lieutenant Governor Patrick's State are listening. The House of Representatives have listened, and they have done so.

The bipartisan House background check bill, H.R. 8, passed the House 240 to 190, on a bipartisan rollcall on February 27. Here we are, over 200 days later. The Senate, which does virtually nothing every single day, through Senator McConnell's leadership, refuses to even consider this bill. Senate Republicans refuse to even consider the bipartisan House-passed gun safety legislation that Americans of both political parties overwhelmingly support.

In fact, they are avoiding taking up any bills at all. Week after week after week, we vote on nomination after nomination after nomination. We hardly ever debate. We hardly ever vote on legislation to address the needs the American people say are the primary concerns on their minds.

While Republican leadership in the Senate these days doesn't seem to like to vote, they do like to tweet. Perhaps we shouldn't have been surprised when one of our Republican colleagues, the junior Senator from Texas, responded to a recent mass shooting by tweeting criticism of gun laws in the city of Chicago.

There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding by this Senator and some other Republicans who believe that, despite what the maps show us, Chicago is actually an island. Well, it is not. They seem to think there is no way that people could actually drive 20 minutes into northwest Indiana, go to a gun show, buy a truckload of guns, and sell them in the alleyways of the city of Chicago at night. It happens. It is the reason why a State law can't solve the problem.

Chicago's mayor--my friend--Lori Lightfoot, pointed out the obvious to the junior Senator from Texas. Sixty percent of illegal firearms recovered in Chicago come from out of State. That is why we need a Federal background check reform bill like the one that passed the House.

Mayor Lightfoot is right. She graciously invited Senator Cruz, our colleague, to come visit Chicago, to see that it is not an island--it is connected to other States--and to see what the city is doing, trying to work to reduce the scourge of gun violence, and how Republican Senators, if they really want to help, can help by passing legislation for true background checks. I hope that the Senator from Texas accepts the invitation. It is a great town. We would like to show it to him.

Another area in which this do-nothing Senate has fallen short is when it comes to public safety threats posed by violent White supremacists. I have introduced the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act. It is the only legislation pending in the Senate to address White supremacist violence.

The gunman in the August 3 mass shooting in El Paso posted a White supremacist manifesto before he shot and killed 22 people and injured 24 others at a Walmart. Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident.

An unclassified May 2017 FBI-DHS joint intelligence bulletin found that ``white supremacist extremism poses [a] persistent threat of lethal violence.'' It also found that White supremacists ``were responsible for 49 homicides in 26 attacks from 2000 to 2016 . . . more than any other domestic extremist movement.''

At a July hearing, FBI Director Mr. Wray told me that the majority of domestic terrorism arrests this year involved White supremacists, White nationalists--and now they call themselves White identitarians, whatever that means.

It is clear that violent White supremacists are the most significant domestic terrorism threat facing America today. What have we done to address this? Nothing. Just like H.R. 8, just like the gun safety legislation, which we should be considering, Senator McConnell refuses to bring anything before the Senate.

My bill, cosponsored by 21 Senators, including the Democratic leader, Senator Schumer, would establish offices to combat domestic terrorism at the Justice Department, FBI, and Department of Homeland Security. These offices will be required to take concrete steps to prevent domestic terrorism, including assessing and publicly reporting on domestic terrorism threats, focusing limited resources on the most significant threats, and providing information, training, and resources to assist State and local and Tribal law enforcement.

This would produce a sustained and coordinated effort with significantly more resources directed towards combating White supremacist violence. It would make America safer.

It is time for the Senate Republican majority leader, Senator McConnell, to let the Senate be a Senate, to actually debate. I stand tonight on the floor--and I am honored to be here, but let's face it, I am giving a speech to a largely empty Chamber in the hopes that some following the speech on C-SPAN or reading it later may take some information of value from it. I would much rather be engaged in a debate at this very moment on H.R. 8, how to pass it--if necessary, how to amend it--but to do something to respond to gun violence in Chicago, in Illinois, and across the entire United States.

It is time for Senator McConnell to let the Senate be the Senate and vote on the House-passed gun background check bill. We need to take up other critical legislation as well to prevent gun violence and domestic terrorism. I hope he will consider my bill to address White supremacist violence. This legislation can make us safer and save lives if we can just bring it to a vote.

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