WARREN: I think you have to ask a broader question here than simply our schools: we have a gun violence problem in America. And it has to do with mass shootings. We also have a gun violence problem with suicide--the lethality of suicide attempts in America--because of the ready availability of guns. And we have a problem with women dying from domestic violence and the increased odds that a woman will die because she is in a house with someone who is an abuser and there is also a gun available. There are studies right now that suggest a waiting period to be able to buy a gun reduces deaths by suicide by somewhere around 11%. We just need to keep working on it, studying, doing more. In an America where more than 90% of Americans want to see us do background checks and get weapons of war off the street--90%, that's Democrats and Republicans and independents--we do nothing. And the United States Senate can't even get a vote.
Walsh: I believe in the second Amendment, plain and simple. The problem we have now in this country is this are these mass shootings. There are a lot of things we need to look at. And I am a big gun guy, but here's what our focus should be on. We don't want anybody who shouldn't have a gun to have a gun. When I leave here in about an hour if I go to a gun dealer down the street and I want to buy a gun, I have to get a federal background check. It makes sense to me that if I buy that same gun at a gun show, I should have to undergo a federal background check. It makes the same sense to me that if I buy a gun online, I should have to undergo the background check. It makes sense that if I buy that same gun from a friend across town I should have got a background check. I think that will help, but then we've got to really take a serious look at mental health issues in this country.
WARREN: The mass shootings are terrible, but they get all the headlines. We have a gun violence problem. The question is when 90 percent of Americans want to see us do background checks, want to get assault weapons off the streets, why doesn't it happen? The answer is corruption. We have a Congress that is beholden to the gun industry. Unless we're willing to roll back the filibuster, we're not going to get anything done on guns.
Q: Senator Sanders, you've said if Donald Trump supports ending the filibuster, you should be nervous. Would you support ending the filibuster?
SANDERS: No. But what I would support is passing major legislation, the gun legislation, Medicare for all, climate change legislation that saves the planet. I will not wait for 60 votes to make that happen, and you can do it in a variety of ways. You can do that through budget reconciliation law.
WARREN: The mass shootings are terrible, but they get all the headlines. We have a gun violence problem. The question is when 90 percent of Americans want to see us do background checks, want to get assault weapons off the streets, why doesn't it happen? The answer is corruption. We have a Congress that is beholden to the gun industry. Unless we're willing to roll back the filibuster, we're not going to get anything done on guns.
Q: Senator Sanders, you've said if Donald Trump supports ending the filibuster, you should be nervous. Would you support ending the filibuster?
SANDERS: No. But what I would support is passing major legislation, the gun legislation, Medicare for all, climate change legislation that saves the planet. I will not wait for 60 votes to make that happen, and you can do it in a variety of ways. You can do that through budget reconciliation law.
KLOBUCHAR: Everyone up here favors an assault weapon ban. Everyone up here favors magazine limitations, which, by the way, would have made a huge difference if that was in place in El Paso [in a recent mass shooting]. And certainly in Dayton, Ohio, where in 30 seconds, one man guns down innocent people. The cops got there in one minute, and it still wasn't enough to save those people. That's what unites us.
You know what else unites us? And I'll tell you this. What unites us is that right now, on Mitch McConnell's desk, are three bills-universal background checks, closing the Charleston loophole, and passing my bill to make sure that domestic abusers don't get AK-47s.
KLOBUCHAR: Everyone here favors an assault weapon ban. Everyone here favors magazine limitations, which, by the way, would have made a huge difference if that was in place in El Paso [in a recent mass shooting]. And certainly in Dayton, Ohio, where in 30 seconds, one man guns down innocent people. The cops got there in one minute, and it still wasn't enough to save those people.
BOOKER: Red flag laws, yes, they're important, but they're nowhere near enough to stop these rising levels of mass shootings. We have to do more. The American public should demand more. And, frankly, things like background checks are overwhelmingly supported by gun owners. The fact that we're not doing that is a failure of leadership.
NINE CANDIDATES HAVE SIMILAR VIEWS: Joseph Biden, Jr.; Cory Booker; John Delaney; Kirsten Gillibrand; Kamala Harris; Amy Klobuchar; Bernard Sanders; Elizabeth Warren; Marianne Williamson.
Sen. Michael Bennet said during a CNN town hall that he "would support" banning assault weapons, despite voting against the proposed Assault Weapons Ban of 2013 following the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
NINE CANDIDATES HAVE SIMILAR VIEWS: Michael Bennet; Joseph Biden, Jr.; Cory Booker; Kirsten Gillibrand; Kamala Harris; Amy Klobuchar; Bernard Sanders; Elizabeth Warren; Marianne Williamson.
Sen. Michael Bennet said during a CNN town hall that he "would support" banning assault weapons, despite voting against the proposed Assault Weapons Ban of 2013 following the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
Former Rep. John Delaney's campaign website calls for a ban on "semiautomatic weapons that have military-style features, including the AR-15," as well as a ban on "high-capacity magazines" and "all accessories designed to increase the rate of fire of a semiautomatic weapon, including bump stocks and trigger cranks."
FIVE CANDIDATES HAVE SIMILAR VIEWS: Steve Bullock; Peter Buttigieg; Beto O`Rourke; Tim Ryan; Andrew Yang.
Former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro, as mayor of San Antonio in 2012, supported renewing the federal assault weapons ban following the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Castro said during a CNN town hall that he supports "things like gun buybacks," adding: "I know that they have had mixed success, but I believe that in some circumstances that's a good policy, and that we can recover some weapons that shouldn't be out there on the street."
Rep. Tim RYAN: These kids are traumatized. We need to start dealing with the trauma that our kids have. We need trauma-based care in every school. 90% of the shooters come from the school they're in, and 73% of them feel shamed, traumatized, or bullied. We need to make sure that these kids feel connected to the school. That means a mental health counselor in every single school. We need to start playing offense. If our kids are so traumatized that they're getting a gun and going into our schools, we're doing something wrong.
Still, the pro-gun reform lawmaker offered some hope for future reform based on Tuesday's elections. "I do believe things are changing. And the reason why I believe that is because we had candidates run in this last election who ran on this issue," she said.
Still, Gillibrand foresaw more work ahead of Democrats to pass stricter gun laws. "We have to obviously flip the Senate to be able to do whatever the House could do, that common-sense reform," Gillibrand said. "But I think the country is in a place where we will fight this until we get it done because you need these basic reforms."
ANALYSIS: Kasich claims that he only calls for "small steps" but he lists "background checks and increased attention to mental illness," which are typical first steps recommended by gun control advocates. Kasich also recommends executive action at the federal level, and action at the state and local level-- methods reasonably likely to overcome NRA opposition. Kasich's evolution on this topic now qualifies him as a moderate on gun rights, where prior to 2018 he was hard-line for the Second Amendment.
John Kasich has spoken out on the need for reasonable reforms to prevent future massacres--including the potential of expanding background checks on gun sales and limiting the ability to sell weapons that have often been used in mass killings.
The 2nd Amendment is one of the most divisive issues in our country. Leadership requires the willingness to tackle these issues and to find solutions. Our country and our children deserve that leadership.
Last year, legislation Kasich signed went into effect that expanded where people can carry concealed handguns to include willing colleges and day-care facilities. But last November in an op-ed, Kasich called for a bipartisan approach to implement some kind of gun reform.
This week, he said Congress' history of inaction on the issue and the likelihood it will not address it in the wake of the recent high profile mass shooting was just one sign of broad dysfunction, citing the immigration debate as another example. "Think about how bad it is in Congress," Kasich said. "They can't decide anything. They can't agree to anything down there."
While there may not be any guaranteed answers as to how we end mass shootings, that does not mean that we should not be doing everything possible to prevent them. We need action. While the American people are divided over various aspects of gun control, the more important truth is that there is now widespread & growing agreement on a variety of actions that would almost certainly lower the level of gun violence in this country.
ANALYSIS: After mass shootings over past years, Senate Democrats introduced new gun legislation. None passed. Booker pointed out that Congress failed to act "in the wake of Newtown," the 2012 mass shooting, when Booker was mayor. When Booker was Senator, the 2016 Orlando mass shooting occurred, and provided Booker an opportunity to "join with others to make a difference," as he promised--that legislation failed too. Booker and Democrats are aware that they cannot pass gun restrictions nationally on "day one"--which is why they try only in the wake of mass shootings.
KLOBUCHAR: Having been the local prosecutor during 9/11 when they caught Moussaoui, in our state [Minnesota], I know that you want to make sure that you have the evidence clear before you make statements about a solution. But we know some of the things that have to happen here. The continual work to root out this evil at its roots at the enclave of ISIS in Iraq and Syria, to stop the flow of the international money, to go after the recruiting that we've seen in the US over the Internet.
Q: In Minnesota, there have been numerous cases about people being recruited to part of the ISIS campaign?
KLOBUCHAR: Yes; dozens of indictments & recent jury verdicts. And what we've found is that individual people are recruited over the Internet. No mom wants their kid recruited to go fight for ISIS. You don't want to indict an entire religion, you don't want to indict an entire community over a lone wolf.
Then we got to it.
"Let me prime the pump: Why not have universal background checks for all gun sales? . Surely, Second Amendment advocates and gun control supporters can find common ground in support of this proposition: Let's examine our laws and make the changes needed to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people.
"It's not enough to prevent dangerous people from getting weapons. We have to do a better job of identifying and helping people who are a threat to themselves and others. That is why we are requesting your support for a comprehensive overhaul of our state's mental health system."
BUSH: We don't need to add new rules. We need to focus on what the bigger issue is: we should focus on is the violence in our communities. The other issue is mental health. Why not begin to deal with the process of mental health issues so that people that are spiraling out of control because of mental health challenges don't have access to guns.
TRUMP: What Jeb said is absolutely correct. We have a huge mental health problem in this country. We're closing hospitals, we're closing wards, we're closing so many because the states want to save money. We have to get back into looking at what's causing it. The guns don't pull the trigger. It's the people that pull the trigger and we have to find out what is going on. You get the Congress. You get the Senate. You get together. You do legislation.
SANDERS: Bernie Sanders has a D-minus voting rating from the NRA. Back in 1988, I told the gun owners of Vermont that I supported a ban on assault weapons. I have strongly avoided instant background checks, doing away with this terrible gun show loophole. And I think we've got to move aggressively at the federal level.
Q: Is Bernie Sanders tough enough on guns?
CLINTON: No, not at all. We have to look at the fact that we lose 90 people a day from gun violence. This has gone on too long and it's time the entire country stood up against the NRA. The majority of our country supports background checks, and even the majority of gun owners do.
SANDERS: Of course not. This was a large and complicated bill. There were provisions in it that I think made sense. For example, do I think that a gun shop in the state of Vermont that sells legally a gun to somebody, and that somebody goes out and does something crazy, that that gun shop owner should be held responsible? I don't. On the other hand, where you have manufacturers and where you have gun shops knowingly giving guns to criminals or aiding and abetting that, of course we should take action.
CLINTON: Senator Sanders did vote for this immunity provision. I voted against it. I was in the Senate at the same time. It wasn't that complicated to me. It was pretty straightforward that he was going to give immunity to the only industry in America. Everybody else has to be accountable, but not the gun manufacturers.
TRUMP: No matter what you'll do you have people that are mentally ill and they have problems and they're going to slip through the cracks.
Q: So no new gun laws?
TRUMP: Well, the gun laws have nothing to do with this. This isn't guns. This is about mental illness. You're always going to have difficulties, no matter how tight you run it. Even if you had great education having to do with mental illness, you educate the community, still you're going to have people that slip through the cracks. And these people are more than slipping through the cracks.
In total, the Department of Justice will award $2.3 million to twelve sites across the country as part of the new Domestic Violence Homicide Prevention Demonstration Initiative (DVHP Initiative). "Every single day in America, three women die at the hands of their boyfriend, or their husband, or their ex-husband. Many of these women have been threatened or severely abused in the past. We know what risk factors put someone in greater danger of being killed by the person they love--and that also means we have the opportunity to step in and try to prevent these murders. That's why these grants are so important. They'll help stop violence before it turns deadly," said Vice President Biden.
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