Gun Control Measures

Floor Speech

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Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, as we grieve with the communities of El Paso, Dayton, and Midland, I can't help but be reminded of the Seattle Jewish Federation, Marysville, Seattle Pacific University, Freeman High School, and so many other communities in my home State of Washington and nationwide that are suffering as a result of tragic and tragically preventable gun violence.

After each of these heartbreaking events, families in Washington State ask me, Why does this keep happening, and why can we not stop it?

The answer is the same every time: We can't stop it because Republicans, led by Leader McConnell and, now, President Trump, will not let us. Because of this inaction, we have entered a very destructive cycle. People going about their days--to school, a movie theater, place of worship--to places where they should feel safe--lose their lives to gun violence.

Communities and Democrats speak out and call for commonsense reforms, such as the universal background checks, which the vast majority of Americans support. Meanwhile, Republicans stand by and refuse to take any meaningful action to stop these violent, senseless, preventable deaths, so nothing happens in Congress.

And then, months, weeks, days, or even hours later, the cycle starts all over again. Every time we have seen this cycle--across all of the terrible shootings that have plagued our country in recent years--there are two common threads. The first is that, in response to tragedy, communities have banded together to make their voices heard and press for change. I have been proud of gun advocates in Washington State, like the Alliance for Gun Responsibility and Moms Demand Action chapters in Spokane and across the State, who are leading the way and staying determined.

The second common thread is Senate Republicans. Every time we push for lifesaving reforms, it always ends at the same place, with the same thing standing in the way of change. The most frustrating part of this is that there are steps we could take right now--today--that will save lives.

The House has passed the universal background check legislation, H.R. 8, with bipartisan support. It is now languishing in the Senate, despite our calls for a vote, all because the majority leader just will not bring it up.

President Trump, who is so willing to use his bully pulpit for far less worthy causes, hasn't used it to take action in ways that could save lives right now. In other words, the President and Senate Republicans continue to make clear they are more interested in protecting the NRA than the families in my home State and across the country. That is simply unacceptable. Democrats are not going to stop calling for action.

Leader McConnell should break the cycle here and now by putting H.R. 8 up for a vote, which would implement universal background checks and close inexplicable gun show and internet loopholes.

Considering that more than 80 percent of Americans support universal background checks, this bill should be a no-brainer. It is the first step we need to take to curb gun violence in our country, but it can't be the only one. If we are serious about truly putting an end to this epidemic, we should look at legislation to expand access to extreme risk protection orders--which has, by the way, been implemented in my home State of Washington--to get guns out of the hands of those who are in crisis. We should limit magazine sizes. We should revive the assault weapons ban and invest in gun violence research prevention.

These commonsense reforms can help us begin to break this cycle. We have to take action now to curb gun violence. That means starting with the universal background check legislation that is waiting right here in the Senate to take action.

My Democratic colleagues in the Senate and I have repeatedly called for a vote on H.R. 8, and we are going to keep putting pressure on Republicans in the Senate until we get one. We can't do it alone. We need to keep lifting up our voices together to demand change, as we did after Sandy Hook, after Parkland, after Marysville, and now following the terror in Texas and in Ohio.

It is not easy. I am not going to give up, and I know the millions of parents and grandparents and students and so many across our Nation are not going to give up either. Together, we can break this senseless cycle. It starts with the majority leader.

While we often disagree on the steps we believe need to be taken, I believe that all of us who are elected in the Senate would say that we came here to make a difference and certainly to do whatever we could to ensure the people we represent are safe. Right now, far too often, they are not. So the Senate is not doing its job.

I call on the majority leader to let us vote on H.R. 8. Let's send it to the President's desk. Let's do what the vast majority of Americans want us to do and take this first step to stop gun violence so we can finally begin to put a stop to this terrible deadly cycle.

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