Congressional Record, Volume 160 Issue 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2014)

[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H62-H65]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

THE CLASS OF 2006 FONDLY PAYS TRIBUTE TO GABBY GIFFORDS

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 3, 2013, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr.
Cohen) for 30 minutes.
Mr. COHEN. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the colleagues that have joined
me today for our 30-minute Special Order, and this is a special Special
Order.
This Special Order is particularly relevant because this is the third
anniversary of the shooting in Tucson that took six lives and injured
13 people, including our colleague, Gabby Giffords. And when I say
``our colleague,'' it is our colleague of all of us here in the House
of Representatives, but as a member of the class of '06 of which
Representative Giffords is, we take special significance in this day
because she was one of our prized Members. We all loved her, and we all
miss her.
The class of '06 is a close class, and we are joined here by one of
the presidents of the class of '06, Mr. Yarmuth, and Mr. Perlmutter, an
active member of the class of '06, and there will be other members
here, as well.
We want to express our remembrances of Gabby, and particularly the
article that she wrote that is in today's New York Times, an op-ed
called ``The Lessons of Physical Therapy.'' It is a very touching
article that talks about her recovery and her indomitable spirit where
she tells about her exercises every day to get back her strength and to
be able to recover speech and physical mobility. Today, in fact, she
skydived.
She is a great spirit who has not let the problems that she has
experienced limit her in any ways more than they have, and she is
trying to overcome these obstacles and teach people that they can
overcome obstacles. She left the House after serving 5 years as a great
colleague and coming back here on August the 1 of 2011 in what was a
very memorable moment on this floor to vote on the debt ceiling, which
was a close vote, and came back in case her vote was needed. And on
that day, I was out at the airport greeting a very close person in my
life and coincidentally was there when she came off the airplane. I saw
Gabby and was able to see her for the first time since the January 8
incident.
Then she was on the floor and of course we all got to see her. But
she came back and made that effort, and she thought about how can she
contribute more. And after Newtown, she knew that she could contribute
more by starting an organization with her great husband, Captain Mark
Kelly, Responsible Solutions, on firearms and gun laws. She tried to
really lead the effort and to make America's laws more sensible, to
save other people from the tragedy that she experienced as did the six
victims that day that died and the others that were injured, including
Congressman Barber, who led us in a moment of silence earlier today on
the floor with the members of the Arizona delegation.
So we wanted to remember that day which is significant. It is a
significant day in congressional history and American history because
that was an assault on Congresspeople meeting with their constituents,
open government, democratic form of government and meeting and
listening. Gabby was engaging in a Congress neighborhood meeting at the
grocery there, which our Ed Perlmutter did a lot of those. I remember
him talking about them in the Caucus.
I first would like to yield at this moment to the president of our
class. Mr. Hodes isn't with us, but the others, the surviving member of
our class, Mr. Yarmuth, from Louisville, Kentucky.
Mr. YARMUTH. I thank the gentleman from Tennessee.
Mr. Speaker, this is a very, very meaningful day. Like so many other
things in our lives, there are certain times, certain events that you
always recall where you were when they occurred. And I remember very
well that Saturday when I was at lunch with a group of friends and
received word that Gabby had been shot. I remember later in the day not
too long after that when the reports were actually that she had passed
away. I remember the feelings I had then.
Fortunately, she did survive, but the emotions of that day live with
me, and, unfortunately, they are reinforced too many times. They have
been reinforced at Newtown and in Aurora. And even before the Gabby
Giffords shooting in Tucson, they were reinforced in my community of
Louisville, Kentucky, where a disgruntled employee shot, with an
assault weapon, a number of coworkers in the Standard Gravure printing
plant that prints the Courier-Journal. I remember also a mass shooting
at Heath High School in Paducah, Kentucky, one of the first school
shootings.
Unfortunately, the list continues to grow. Many of these inexplicable
shootings are committed with weapons that are designed only to inflict
massive casualties. And after Newtown, I spoke out the next day in
saying actually that I was sorry that I had not spoken out on a regular
basis, that I vowed at that point, as Gabby has vowed every day of her
life over the last 3 years, to make it a mission to try and create
saner gun laws in this country. Even in my State of Kentucky, with a
very, very long and significant gun culture, vast majorities of our
citizens believe that we ought to have universal background checks, and
yet we have not been able to make any ground in that effort.
I think most people realize that in that Gabrielle Giffords shooting
that Jared Loughner, the perpetrator, was actually wrestled to the
ground when he had stopped to reload because he did not have a 30-
capacity magazine. He had a lesser capacity magazine. And yet we can't
deal with, again, these weapons and magazines made to inflict damage on
many, many people.
I can't help but think that a lot of the frustration with Congress,
with

[[Page H63]]

this government, throughout the country is not a function of our
inability or unwillingness to work the will of the American people. As
we remember now this tragedy of 3 years ago and also remember the
incredible work of Gabby Giffords over these last 3 years in trying to
create a saner approach to guns in this country, it is important that
we recognize that we do have an obligation to respond to what the
American people want us to do. And if we would take simple steps, sane
steps and logical steps, like requiring everyone who purchases a weapon
in this country to undergo a background check, then maybe our approval
rating, maybe the confidence and the credibility of government will
improve slightly.
So it is an honor to stand here on the floor and to pay tribute to a
friend, a colleague, and a great American who continues to fight for
her country and our citizens and to urge all of us to think about what
she has stood for over the last 3 years and rededicate our efforts to
improving the lives of and the security of the American people.
Mr. COHEN. Thank you, Mr. Yarmuth.
Mr. Perlmutter, a member of our class, represents a district that has
seen so much tragedy from firearms. I know he has been a leader on this
effort in Colorado and in the country, and I appreciate him being here
as one of the strong members of our class on this issue and other
issues. I yield to Mr. Perlmutter.
Mr. PERLMUTTER. Well, I thank my friend from Tennessee and my friend
from Kentucky. Three years ago today, one of our best friends here,
Gabby Giffords, was shot, shot at close range, shot when she was doing
her job, Congress on the Corner. She was out in front of a Safeway in
Tucson, Arizona, meeting with constituents.

Our job as Members of Congress is to be the voice of our district, to
listen to what the people in our districts have to say about a million
different subjects and be their voice here in Washington, D.C. She was
just that. She was the voice of that district. And she worked hard, she
represented them, and she was enthusiastic and energetic and a voice of
reason here in Washington, D.C., and she was shot.
But that hasn't stopped her. This woman has such energy, such
discipline and such perseverance that she just keeps going. She is
dealing with a subject that is very tough to address in the United
States of America. On the one hand, we have the Second Amendment, and
law-abiding citizens have rights under the Second Amendment to possess
weapons. On the other hand, people have the right not to be shot. And
she is trying, as part of her work these days, to make sure that people
who are criminals, who are domestic abusers, who may have mental health
issues aren't in possession of weapons that can hurt people. And as the
gentleman from Tennessee said, in my area we have had shootings at
Columbine High School and at the Aurora movie theater. Seventy people a
year and a half ago, July of 2012, were shot. And in Colorado we have
addressed it, but not without some real resistance by some communities.
What we want to make sure here in this country is that people who are
law-abiding citizens can have their weapons, but they should undergo a
background check to make sure that they are not domestic abusers or
criminals or stalkers. We need to make sure of those kinds of things.
And Gabby is working hard to make sure that that happens after--she is
doing that on top of her rehabilitation. Her work ethic is second to
none in doing this.
There is a lot of work to be done to try to minimize gun violence,
and there is a lot of work that she is doing to recover. And this woman
was doing both of those things when she nearly died from a shot at
close quarters. She is tough. She is an American through and through,
and she never says die. She is going to continue to work and work for
the betterment of her community and of this Nation.
I'm glad that I got a chance to say something, Mr. Cohen, in terms of
some kind of tribute to the effort that she is making on behalf of so
many of us.

{time} 1830

So I would return, or I can lead to one of our other classmates of
'06, but I can say we are very proud of Gabby Giffords, both when she
was here and now in the service that she provides to our Nation just in
her everyday life.
Mr. COHEN. I thank you, Mr. Perlmutter. I appreciate your remarks.
You are a leader on this issue, and so is Mr. Courtney who is so
intimately involved with Newtown, another area that suffered from gun
violence. I yield to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney),
another member of the class of '06.
Mr. COURTNEY. I thank you, Mr. Cohen. I want to thank you for
organizing this event. The group that is here tonight, the class of
'06, was a very tight-knit group. Every Wednesday we would meet in the
morning. Gabby was one of the leaders of that group. She was an
outstanding Congresswoman. She sat with me on the Armed Services
Committee. She had an Air Force base in Arizona, and she was tenacious
in terms of the Defense authorization bill markups ever year in terms
of making sure that that base was fully protected and represented to
the maximum extent.
She also was a huge advocate for the post-9/11 GI Bill. Some of us
remember that struggle to expand the GI Bill and to restore the benefit
for soldiers and veterans and their families that had deteriorated over
time, giving again the full tuition benefit for a 4-year college within
the State in which the servicemember resides, and to extend that
benefit to spouses and children.
Just a few days ago actually, the Department of Veterans Affairs
announced the 1 millionth enrollee in that program. Again, Gabby was at
the absolute beginning of that struggle which again had to overcome
active resistance from the then-Bush administration. There were
negotiations that finally got that measure passed and through. Again, a
million families of servicemembers have benefited from it.
By the way, an interesting parenthetical observation was that when
that program went online, it had a huge technological computer
malfunction. Secretary Shinseki and the VA had to manually cut checks
so that tuition payments were made. Obviously, there are echoes of
problems that we are struggling with here today. But again, Gabby's
record in terms of restoring that GI Bill benefit and in fact expanding
it is one of the great accomplishments of her time in Congress.
As my friend from Colorado said, her record since her injury is
really amazing. I remember standing in the back of the Chamber when she
cast her final vote as a Member of Congress. It was the budget package
that again kept the country from defaulting. When she walked through
that door, limping up those steps, it was almost a miraculous moment.
Only a small group of people knew she had flown out here to cast that
ballot. Again, it showed her patriotism that she felt that her country
was in trouble and her country needed her; and despite all of her
difficulties and disabilities, she wanted to be here to cast that
ballot. Again, it was a capstone to just an extraordinary record of
service for her district.
As Mr. Cohen mentioned, I come from the State of Connecticut, which
is obviously the State where the Sandy Hook shooting took place
slightly over a year ago. Again, a traumatic event. Connecticut is a
very small State. Newtown High School, where President Obama came and
spoke to the families and the first responders a couple of days after
the incident, is about 50 minutes from my house, and I live in the
furthest district from the Fifth Congressional District where Newtown,
Connecticut, is located. So again, it had reverberations all across the
State. We had family members who live in the Second Congressional
District who lost loved ones in that horrendous incident.
And, frankly, just before the break, a lot of those families came and
visited Washington, D.C. It had been a year since that incident. And as
Mr. Yarmuth indicated, the frustration about the fact that this city
did not respond to that just absolutely horrific event where 6-year-
olds and 7-year-olds lost their lives to an individual who should never
have been in possession of high-powered weapons, or weapons of any
kind, again has not resulted in any legislative change.
I do think it is important to give the administration credit that a
few weeks ago they did issue new rules so that mental health collection
of data for the Brady system is going to be strengthened. If you look
again at the

[[Page H64]]

series of events that have occurred in communities since Sandy Hook,
even just down the road here at the D.C. naval yard, again it was
another individual, deranged individual, again who should never have
been in a position to possess weapons. And the rules that were issued a
few days ago will expand the scope of court findings, whether it is a
worker's compensation case or whether it is a probate court case where
an individual has been found to be mentally ill to the point where they
can't support themselves and should get Social Security disability
benefits. That commonsense change is now going to feed into the Brady
system so that record checks will at least administratively be
strengthened.
But clearly, the gun-shop loophole, the patchwork reporting needs to
be strengthened by an act of Congress, and that certainly is what Gabby
is calling upon all of us to have the courage to be able to look these
families in the eye who came to Washington a few weeks ago and said we
understand that that never should have happened and that we are
prepared to make changes, commonsense changes, constitutional changes,
to the system.
You know, I think it is important to note, as Mr. Perlmutter said, if
you read the D.C. v. Heller case, which is the hallmark case of an
individual right to bear arms, and you read Justice Scalia's decision,
he made it crystal clear that the right to own firearms does not extend
to criminals, to the mentally ill, and certain classes and categories
of weapons, whether it is fully automatic machine guns or other weapons
that are not in common need or use, are not protected by the D.C. v.
Heller decision. Like any portion of the Bill of Rights, there are
balanced restrictions which the courts recognize and give us the
latitude to do our job and to make commonsense changes.
So, again, Gabby's injuries, which again took place 3 years ago, it
is hard to believe that that much time has gone by. We still have to
hold on to that and make sure that her amazing service in the Congress,
and also her record of advocacy, is something we live up to to that
example, that inspiring example, and do what is right for the American
people.
I yield back to my friend, Mr. Cohen.
Mr. COHEN. Gabby was a member of the NRA; I don't know if she is now.
I passed the right-to-carry bill in Tennessee because I think you can
have reasonable laws that allow people to defend themselves, but there
is reasonableness. And the problem we have had has been reasonableness,
and Gabby's effort with her husband Mark is responsible solutions. It
is not banning guns; it is responsible solutions.
Mental health is certainly one of those issues that has been raised,
and yet we in our budgets have cut mental health with the budgets that
we have had up here. Some have blamed and the response has been about
violent games that children might play or be exposed to. Those weren't
around when Charles Joseph Whitman went to the tower in Austin, Texas,
and killed 17 people and wounded 32. That wasn't the cause of it. It is
something, unfortunately, uniquely American. It is a uniquely American
problem. Studies have shown that the U.S. homicide rates are 6.9 times
greater than the rates in other high-income countries, and they are
driven by firearm homicide rates that are 19.7 times higher.

In the 27 countries that were studied of higher industrialized
countries, 80 percent of all firearm deaths occur in the United States,
and 86 percent of women killed by firearms were United States women,
and 87 percent of the children were United States children.
The gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch), a member of the class of '06
has joined us, and I know he has understandings of these issues, too,
and is a responsible and reasonable voice. I yield to him for his
comments and thoughts.
Mr. WELCH. Thank you, Mr. Cohen. It is so wonderful to hear about our
classmate. We who were elected with Gabby had a special privilege to
get to know her personally and to see her grit and her determination
and her gracefulness and her effectiveness representing her district,
and the incredible job she did on the Armed Services Committee. I
remember all of the things that you mentioned, and she had a kind word
for everybody. She didn't forget anything. She was totally devoted to
her staff and to her constituents. What a pleasure it was. All of us, I
think, felt if Congress was filled with folks like Gabby Giffords, the
world would be a better place, even Congress.
Since her shooting 3 years ago, America has gotten a glimpse into
that person of character and beauty that all of us got to know as a
classmate. What an extraordinary person she is. I just want to read a
little bit from her op-ed because it kind of captures things. When this
happened 3 years ago, she mentions that she was allowed the opportunity
for a new life, but she had planned to spend her 40s continuing her
public service and starting a family with this wonderful man, her
husband, who she married while she was in service here in Congress,
Mark Kelly. Remember when we saw Mark Kelly struggling with the
question of his wife in the hospital and having to decide whether to
continue to command the mission into space, and how he struggled with
that, wanting to be doing what he was trained all his life to do, and
be also the extraordinary husband that he was, and how Gabby was his
biggest supporter that he continue the mission. What a couple they are.
And then to hear her describe what she has had to go through. She was
really athletic. She rode horses, and she rode motorcycles. She hiked
up and down the Grand Canyon. She was very physically fit and vigorous,
an outdoors woman. In that moment when she was shot, the question was
whether she was going to live. She did--a blessing for her, for us, for
America, and her family. But her life then required her to face
incredible challenges--how to learn things that we now take for
granted. She describes:

I spent the last 3 years learning how to talk again, how to
walk again. I had to learn to sign my name with my left hand.
It is gritty, painful, frustrating work every day. And rehab
is endlessly repetitive. It is never easy because once you
have mastered some movement or action or word, no matter how
small, you move on to the next. You never rest.

What Gabby did, that was the life that was in front of her, and she
had to make a decision about whether to engage and plunge forward,
knowing how hard that would be, how repetitive that would be, and she
did it. Of course, she has been making progress, incredible progress,
and she celebrates in this op-ed that she didn't image that her
stricken, paralyzed arm would ever move again. For so many days it did
not, until one day it did.
So she faces life and embraces this new life that is nothing compared
to that athletic, horse-riding, motorcycle-riding, and Grand Canyon
climbing person that was very easy for her to be.
She had all of that, those personal qualities with this enormous
commitment to public life and had a belief that what we did to try to
shape public policy mattered. How you treated the person in your life,
the ones you love, incredibly important; but how you use that love to
try to build laws that create opportunities for a better, less violent,
more peaceful society. She had the energy and the heart to do that as
well. And she is continuing that with her cause, working side by side
with her husband, Mark, for sensible gun legislation.
You know, when I think about what she has done, and, sure, we can
have a legitimate debate about what is the right law. I definitely
think the background checks, why wouldn't we have that apply to
everybody. It doesn't restrict their ability; it just means they go
through the check. When I consider that and think, all right, there are
legitimate debates on both sides, and the Second Amendment is extremely
important and we are all supporters of it, but what is the problem with
Congress voting on it. Why is it that we can't summon the will to
simply put on the floor for a debate and then a vote where each one of
us says ``yes'' or ``no'' on that proposed legislation, background
check, and let Americans then decide what they think of us, whether
they agree with us or they don't.
You know, at a certain point, it is just a question of whether we
will do our job, and doing our job is debating the major issues of the
time that are of concern to the people of this country, and then
standing and voting ``yes'' or ``no.''
I say we owe that to Gabby. Gabby wouldn't see it that way. She would
say that we owe it to ourselves to take

[[Page H65]]

on the responsibility that we sought when we ran for public office and
took on the privilege of representing the people who sent us here.

{time} 1845

So I say thank you to Gabby for all she has done, and I challenge us
to try to do a little bit of what Gabby would do if she were here to
help us today.
Mr. COHEN. Mr. Speaker, how much time do we have remaining?
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Tennessee has 3 minutes
remaining.
Mr. COHEN. At this point, I would like to yield to the gentleman from
Colorado (Mr. Perlmutter).
Mr. PERLMUTTER. I thank the gentleman from Tennessee, because I want
to just talk about something Mr. Welch said and also something Mr.
Courtney said.
Mr. Courtney said that she had worked on some things involving
technology with respect to the VA, and there were some technological
problems with whatever it was she was getting. She was a curious, and
is a curious, individual. She brought a curiosity about technology. She
was one of the first adopters of the iPad as we began using it here.
She just had become an expert in it long before any of the rest of us.
She also was strong enough that she worked in her dad's tire store.
So here is a woman who brought that energy, brought that enthusiasm,
brought that curiosity and brought a real service, a desire for service
to this country. Despite terrible wounds, she continues that service
today. If we could all do that this Nation would be unbelievable. It is
our job to continue to try to provide that service and follow her
example. Despite all the obstacles, here is a woman still changing the
world. I am very glad to be able to speak for her in this moment today,
3 years after she was shot, but she is still making a difference.
Mr. COHEN. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank all the Members. There were others that
would have been here but had certain conflicts at this time.
We all loved Gabby. She was the star of our class. It was before 3
years ago on the 8th of January that she was the star of our class. We
all knew it, and we all loved her.
I want to thank each of our colleagues for joining us. I want to
thank Gabby for her service and her continued service. She is an
American hero.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

____________________