[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 22 (Thursday, February 3, 2022)]
[House]
[Page H944]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
GUN VIOLENCE SURVIVORS WEEK
(Ms. STEVENS asked and was given permission to address the House for
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
Ms. STEVENS. Madam Speaker, I rise solemnly today, at the start of
this new year, to draw attention to an appalling national benchmark.
This is Gun Violence Survivors Week, the time of year that gun deaths
in America surpass the number of gun deaths that most other countries
will mourn at the end of the year, if at all.
Madam Speaker, 2022 is barely underway, and yet, here we are.
Exceptional in the most disastrous and yet unacceptable way, already at
a completely incomprehensible count of lives lost to the scourge of gun
violence in the country. Gun violence leaves a mark on each individual
and community it impacts, and it spares none of our constituents and
none of our fellow countrymen and women.
Madam Speaker, this week, I am thinking about the students and
parents back home in Michigan, in Oakland County, who can no longer
distinguish between a practice exercise and an active shooter scenario
in our schools. The threats have been perpetual, and the violence has
become too real for far too many.
So we join in this House of Representatives to commit to acting on
gun safety legislation. For those who are not working for it, are
working against it.
____________________