The Nashville school shooting has reignited the debate about whether new federal laws could curb gun violence, but lawmakers serving in a divided Congress appear to be pessimistic about passing additional gun legislation.
Earlier this week, President Joe Biden acknowledged he’s done all he can do through executive action on gun control and pleaded with Congress to act after the mass shooting at a Nashville private school that killed three children and three adults on Monday. He also renewed his push for lawmakers to reinstate a nationwide ban on assault-style weapons and high-capacity magazines that expired in 2004.
NASHVILLE SHOOTING: HUNDREDS PROTEST AT TENNESSEE STATE CAPITOL AFTER COVENANT SCHOOL KILLINGS
Tensions hit a boiling point on Capitol Hill Wednesday after Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) got into a screaming match with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) over gun control just off the House floor. Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) admits “passions are running high on the issue” and urged Republicans to allow lawmakers to have a formal debate on the assault-style weapons ban.
“Let's debate the issue of gun safety in front of the American people,” Jeffries said on Thursday. “Stop hiding your position. We have our position. Let’s air this out.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) sidestepped a question from a reporter Tuesday about whether he would commit to putting the legislation on the Senate floor.
“I care passionately about this, I’m the author of the bill that passed in 1994, and we’re working hard to get enough votes to pass it,” Schumer said.
Senate Democrats are attempting to adjust expectations about the reality of passing legislation with a slim 51-seat majority and enough Republicans to keep them from reaching the 60-vote threshold for breaking a filibuster.
“I’m a realist,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) told the Washington Post. “I know what’s going to happen on the floor.”
Republicans in both chambers continue to reject any action that would restrict access to guns and emphasize mental health as the cause of the violence.
“I don’t think there’s any appetite for it,” Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) said of the potential for new gun control legislation.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said Thursday that legislation alone cannot prevent school shootings.
“I would say to the nation as a whole that the problem that we are today is not just going to be legislation,” McCarthy told reporters. “We got to have a severe conversation here with this country. We’ve got to deal with mental illness.”
Some Republicans are calling for more law enforcement measures at schools, an effort that has been opposed by some Democrats in the past.
TENNESSEE SENATORS PROPOSE ADDING SAFETY OFFICIALS TO SCHOOLS AFTER NASHVILLE SHOOTING
“We have to work to protect children at school, and that means increasing security,” said Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) at a Judiciary Committee hearing this week.
“I have had legislation that would allow for training and hiring of veterans and former law enforcement officials to serve as school safety officers and help protect our schools,” she added. “It is time for us to pass that.”
Lawmakers were able to enact a law last year that enhanced background checks for gun sales for those under 21, invested in school-based mental health services and school safety, and provided incentives in the form of funding for states to enact red flag laws that allow officials to confiscate firearms temporarily from those who are determined to be a threat to themselves or others.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), one of the key Republicans to negotiate the package passed last summer, rejected the call to ban assault-style weapons, saying some people like to use them for hunting or self-defense.
“They have a constitutional right to do so,” he told reporters. “There seems to be this obsession with the gun and not with the actual person pulling the trigger.”
The Texas senator said he doesn’t believe there’s much more Congress will be able to do and said lawmakers should focus on implementing the bill they passed last year, alluding to the red flag portion of the bill. Only 20 states, including the District of Columbia, have enacted some form of the law.
Sen. John Thune (R-SD), the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, said it was too early to discuss legislation when pressed by a reporter Tuesday asking if Republicans are ignoring public polling that has shown a majority of voters support universal background checks.
“I think with respect to any discussion of legislation, it is premature. There’s an ongoing investigation, and I think we need to let the facts come out,” he said.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, who has worked on previous negotiations concerning gun legislation, didn’t completely close the door to future discussions.
“I don’t know if there’s much space to do more, but I’ll certainly look and see,” Graham told reporters.
Some Democratic lawmakers are attempting to pass legislation with a narrower focus that would boost federal research to study the causes of gun violence. Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) unveiled legislation on Wednesday that would allocate $50 million each year for five years to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to study gun violence.
“We know this is not a panacea, but it's a piece of the puzzle that for 20 years that was barred," he said, flanked by former students of Michigan State University, Oxford High School, and Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School, all the targets of shootings. “We must invest in this research because by doing that, we will gain a better understanding of the root cause of gun violence in the United States, a crisis that affects all Americans, regardless of age, race, or political affiliation.”
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Over the past three years, the Democratic-controlled Congress reversed a prior funding provision that prevented the CDC from researching gun violence and allocated millions of dollars for them to do so, including $25 million for this fiscal year. The proposal is unlikely to move forward in the Republican-controlled House.
While House Democrats cannot control what the chamber votes on, some have discussed utilizing a legislative procedure called a discharge petition to force a vote on gun legislation. To move forward, Democrats would need 218 lawmakers to support it, which would require all House Democrats plus five Republicans to join them. Jeffries remains noncommittal on that front.