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Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, when the Senate considers complex and profound issues of public policy, I am particularly reminded of the wisdom of our late friend, Mr. Mike Enzi, the Senator from Wyoming. Not long after I came to the Senate, I noticed how productive that Senator Enzi, one of the most conservative Members of the Senate, was working on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee with Teddy Kennedy, the ``liberal lion of the Senate.'' You had one of the most conservative Members of the Senate working with one of the most liberal Members of the Senate. But, amazingly, to me, they seemed to get a lot done.

So I asked Senator Enzi, I said: How is it that you, a staunch conservative, could work so productively with somebody with such different views? Senator Enzi told me: It is easy. I call it the 80-20 rule.

Well, the fact of life is we are not going to agree with everybody 100 percent of the time. And I sometimes say I don't agree with my wife 100 percent of the time, but she is always right.

But, seriously, if we are going to get things done here in the U.S. Senate for the benefit of the American people, we have to understand nobody is going to get everything they want. And I think for purposes of simplicity, an illustration of Senator Enzi's comments about the 80- 20 rule are very helpful.

I have tried to employ that strategy many times since those days, and I hope we can apply that wisdom and strategy again dealing with this recent string of shootings, including Uvalde, TX.

Now this debate evokes strong emotions and strong opinions from people across the political spectrum, and it is an understatement to say that there are serious differences of opinion.

I start with the premise that I took an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States, and I have no intention of violating that oath. That is where I start. Part of the Constitution is the amendments, including the first 10 which are the Bill of Rights that includes the Second Amendment, which provides a constitutional right to keep and bear arms for law-abiding Americans. I have no intention of violating my oath, and I have no intention of undermining the rights of law-abiding gun owners in America because it is a constitutional right.

It is no secret that when it comes to the culture in America, there are very different views ranging from, let's say, Connecticut, where Senator Murphy comes from, to places like Texas, where guns are commonplace but people know how to use them and they use them responsibly and they are not a threat to public safety.

There are those who would like to restrict the rights of law-abiding gun owners because that is their view--they strongly hold that view, but I have been clear that is a nonstarter for me.

But to Senator Enzi's wise advice, rather than focus on the 20 percent we can't agree on, I have been trying to explore common ground with our colleagues on a bipartisan basis. These were devastating tragedies. We all agree with that. We all agree that no child should ever fear for his or her safety while sitting in a classroom.

I think we even all agree that there is a mental health epidemic in America today, and that is a piece of the puzzle. To me the shootings are a symptom of a larger problem, which is the failure of our mental health system in America, and it manifests itself in many different ways. Now, people suffering from mental health challenges, by and large, they are not violent, but a subset of them threaten their own lives with suicide. Some of them, even a subset of others, not only commit suicide by attacking a known armed police contingent, but they also engage in homicides, too, which is what happened with Salvador Ramos in Uvalde, TX.

I think there is a consensus in America that criminals and people experiencing severe mental health crises should not have access to guns. It is not just my opinion; it is actually the law. That is what the National Instant Criminal Background Check System is supposed to vet for--to make sure that people who have criminal records, people who have been institutionalized for mental health problems, people who are dishonorably discharged, people who are under a protective order, people who have committed felonies, people who have committed domestic violence, those are all people who now, if you went to buy a firearm and underwent a national instant criminal background check, you would not be able to legally purchase or possess a firearm because that is the law of the land and has been a long time.

With that in mind, Senator Murphy from Connecticut, Senator Tillis from North Carolina, Senator Sinema from Arizona, and I have been looking at these various factors and tried to come up with a targeted bill that might have prevented some of these tragedies. To me, that is the best way to look at this, is to say: If this had been in place, is it less likely that this tragedy would have occurred? Stated another way, If we do this, is there a chance or a probability that we could save lives in the future? To me, that should be our focus.

Instead of wasting time talking about what we don't agree on, I think it is productive for us to focus on this subset of issues where I believe there is room for a consensus because, of course, that is the only way to make progress and to get a result.

When the Constitution was written, it created three branches of government; but in particular, the legislative and the executive branch, with two branches of the Congress. They are very different in their nature. They made it difficult to pass legislation. It is hard. We do it, but it is hard. And it is hard because it takes consensus, and consensus sometimes takes time, particularly on issues that evoke such strong views and opinions and reflect, frankly, the diversity of this country.

I am glad to say, on this topic, we are making steady progress. It is early in the process, but I am optimistic where things stand right now. What am I optimistic about? I am optimistic that we could pass a bill in the Senate, it can pass the House, and it will get a signature by President Biden. It will become law of the land.

What is the test of that legislation? It is, to me, not whether it meets your ideological standard of what the bill should look like, but it is simply this: Will it save lives? If it will, it is worth all of our best efforts.

As I said, there is broad agreement about the mental health challenges, not only in our schools, but in our society at large and how that manifests itself. Sixty percent of the gun deaths in America are suicides. Don't we want to try to prevent those suicides? I think so. That is why the mental health issue is so important, among other reasons. And then, obviously, the school safety issues. We need to try to figure out ways to make our schools harder to get into for people like Salvador Ramos.

Unfortunately, the mental health challenges of young, disaffected, and alienated boys is a profile that is all too familiar. It is reflected in the shooter in Uvalde. It is reflected in the shooter in Sandy Hook, Adam Lanza. They came from much different places in terms of their socioeconomics, but in terms of their alienation and their developing mental illness and their willingness to not only take their own life but other people's lives, unfortunately, it paints an eerily similar picture.

The shooter in Uvalde was isolated and bullied at school. He had a record of cutting his face--self-mutilation--and abusing and torturing animals, and he was known for fighting and threatening his fellow students with everything from assault to rape. He was a ticking time bomb, and many people--not all the people but many people in this small community of 15,000 people knew it. Certainly, his mother knew it. Unfortunately, his mother was a drug user, and he was living with his grandmother. But this is a young man who shot his own grandmother because she wanted him to go back to school because, of course, he had been out of the classroom because of COVID-19 restrictions. Frankly, that isolation just made his mental illness that much worse.

As I said, the shooter at Sandy Hook, Adam Lanza, experienced what was later described as ``severe and deteriorating'' mental health problems that went untreated, not because his parents didn't try--they did--but when he was prescribed medication to help him manage his mental illness, he refused to take it, and his mom finally gave up, exhausted, as you can imagine. It was a period of 3 years that he didn't see any mental health provider at all, sitting in his room, playing video games, killing people online virtually, becoming increasingly desensitized, and spiraling down that psychiatric, psychological, and emotional drain.

We need to equip all of our young people in America with the resources and the assistance they need in order to manage their emotional and mental health struggles. I think that is part of what we need to do.

School security, as I said, was also a glaring issue at Uvalde. The shooter was able to enter Robb Elementary School through a door that wasn't even locked. That is a problem. School districts need to be prepared for the worst-case scenario. They need to prepare for the worst and hope for the best. That means evaluating physical security, reviewing current protocols, developing best practices, and potentially adding or expanding the number of school resource officers. Those are law enforcement officers on campus.

I think there is a lot of common ground on things we can agree on here--safer schools, better mental health resources, and coming up with additional assistance that will harden our schools and provide greater deterrence and protections for our students.

The Senators whom I have been talking to--including the group of four but even the larger group today at noon--we have been talking about other things we might do to keep individuals who are already prohibited by law because they have a criminal background or they have mental health adjudications and problems.

How do we keep guns out of the hands of criminals and those who are undergoing mental health crises? That is an area of common ground. This is not about creating new restrictions on law-abiding citizens; it is about ensuring the system we already have in place works as intended.

One idea we have discussed is, because this young man in Uvalde turned 18 and because there was no look back at his juvenile record, he passed a background check. It is as if he was born on his 18th birthday and nothing that happened before was important. That is obviously a problem. So we are looking at taking steps to encourage States to upload juvenile records into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. This is standard practice in some but not most States, and it is easy to see why it is important. If we are uploading information about adults' mental health adjudications but we don't have access to juveniles' mental health adjudications, to me, that is a problem. If a 17-year-old, for example, is convicted of aggravated assault, the record should show up in his background check if he tries to purchase a gun when he turns 18.

I think this is a commonsense way to make sure the National Instant Criminal Background Check databases are complete and they are accurate. That is not about expanding the system; that is about making sure the system we have actually works.

I want to make sure that we are committed to providing due process protections for citizens in all circumstances. Again, this is part of our Constitution, due process of law--the right to appear, the right to contest a decision by the government and to produce evidence and to cross-examine witnesses. That is an essential aspect of due process. When you talk about depriving somebody of a constitutional right, it is even more important.

The goal here is to make a law; it is not to make a political statement. As I said, I am encouraged by the progress we are making, but I don't think artificial deadlines are useful. The majority leader, Senator Schumer, has threatened to schedule votes if an agreement isn't reached by a certain time. I don't think that is particularly helpful.

Again, my goal and I think most Senators' goal here is to come up with a bill that can pass; otherwise, we might as well move on to other topics. But I sense a feeling of urgency and a desire to actually get things done. Around here, if you know people have the will, there is a way, and I believe there is a collective bipartisan will. So far, everybody, I believe, has been working in good faith. We all understand the differences that we have regionally and culturally when it comes to things like the Second Amendment. We understand the different politics in different States. That is the genius of the Senate that brings us all together. It doesn't make it easy, but it makes it possible for us to try to find some common ground.

The most common cry you hear today when it comes to incidents like Uvalde is to do something. I think we agree with that, but what that something is is not easy, but it is important, and we need to try. Again, I am optimistic because of the progress we have made so far that we will do something here that is important that will save lives. To me, that is the goal. And I think all 100 Senators would agree, if we can achieve that goal, then our efforts will have been worthwhile.

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