Cloture Motion

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, the American people have had to endure two of the worst mass shootings in recent history in just the span of 10 days. One of them happened to be in my home State of New York in the dear city of Buffalo; the other happened yesterday in Texas, the worst school shooting since Sandy Hook, and we can't get out of our minds--I can't--the picture of 10, 11, and 9-year-olds being shot, killed, just ready to burst into the adolescent and adult phases of their lives.

What the American people want is real solutions to our Nation's gun violence epidemic. We have had too many moments of silence, too many thoughts and prayers. Americans are sick of it. Many in this Chamber are sick of it.

Here is the sad truth about what happened yesterday and why I plan to object to my colleague's UC: hardening schools would have done nothing to prevent this shooting. In fact, there were guards and police officers already at the school yesterday when the shooter showed up. One was a school police officer, two were from the Uvalde Police Department. The shooter got past all of them with two assault weapons that he purchased. They couldn't stop him.

The bill would not have protected those children. More guns won't protect our children. That is the wrong answer. There are too many guns and too many options for the wrong people to get guns.

So I plan to object to passing this measure today through consent, but I would tell my colleague from Wisconsin, tomorrow we can begin voting on a bill that will take us--that will let us take action on guns, and we could consider amendments like this then, along with others.

Tomorrow, the Senate is scheduled to take the first step--the first step--in responding to the shooting that happened in my home State of New York 2 weeks ago and so many other mass shootings over the years that have been motivated by race.

The Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act, which I set in motion earlier this week, is a necessary and timely step to honor the memories of the dead in Buffalo and to make sure mass shootings motivated by race don't happen again.

I urge all my Republican colleagues to vote to get on the bill. All we are asking is a vote ``yes'' on the motion to proceed.

I urge my colleague from Wisconsin to vote yes on that bill.

If Senator Johnson helps us get on the domestic terrorism bill, we could consider amendments related to guns--his and others' who have a different point of view. If Republicans can vote with us to get on that bill, we can have a debate on considering commonsense, strong gun safety amendments, hopefully with bipartisan support. The Senator from Wisconsin says his bill is bipartisan. There are five Republican sponsors.

The bottom line is, if you want to have bipartisan debates, you don't just say: My bill must pass by unanimous consent, and no other bill can pass. I am providing a path that we can have a debate on these amendments.

Let me be clear. We are going to vote on gun legislation, and the Republicans could let us start doing that as soon as tomorrow if they simply vote yes on the motion to proceed, and I give them a pledge that we will then start debating gun amendments--Senator Johnson's and many others' who have a different point of view. I repeat, though, we are going to vote on gun legislation. The American people are tired of moments of silence, tired of the kind words offering thoughts and prayers.

We can use the domestic terrorism bill tomorrow to begin--I repeat, to begin--considering gun safety amendments, and we can consider the proposal he brings to the floor today. So we won't just have this amendment; we will have a lot of amendments to debate. That seems perfectly fair and, in fact, bipartisan.

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