[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 25 (Thursday, February 6, 2020)]
[House]
[Page H857]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      GUN VIOLENCE IS AN EPIDEMIC

  (Mr. HUFFMAN asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. HUFFMAN. Madam Speaker, what if I told you there was an epidemic 
in the United States that has killed close to 40,000 people, just in 
the year 2019 alone?
  And what if I told you this epidemic has taken the lives of almost 
8,000 people since 2014 in California alone?
  I am not talking about coronavirus, or Ebola, or AIDS, or some global 
pandemic. This public health crisis is uniquely American. I am talking, 
of course, about gun violence.
  We have let this public health epidemic go unchecked far too long. If 
gun violence were a disease with the death numbers I just shared with 
you, we would not rest until we had a cure. But because many Members of 
Congress are frozen in their ability to act in the face of the money 
the NRA pours into the gun lobby, we haven't acted; especially the 
Senate has not stepped up to act.
  This week is National Gun Violence Survivors Week, where we honor the 
lives lost to gun violence and share the stories of those whose lives 
have been affected.
  This disease does have a cure. We need the Senate to hear our urgency 
and to act on gun violence legislation now.

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