[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 91 (Wednesday, May 25, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2679-S2680]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       PETTY OFFICER 1ST CLASS CHARLES JACKSON FRENCH POST OFFICE

  A bill (H.R. 4168) to designate the facility of the United States 
Postal Service located at 6223 Maple Street in Omaha, Nebraska, as the 
``Petty Officer 1st Class Charles Jackson French Post Office'', was 
ordered to a third reading, was read the third time, and passed.
  Ms. STABENOW. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business for up to 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                    Robb Elementary School Shooting

  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I rise to speak about yesterday's 
horrific tragedy in Texas, and I won't be long; I know we have votes 
coming up.
  But I wanted to start by expressing, I think, both the grief and the 
outrage that we see all across the country that,

[[Page S2680]]

yet again--and not just another tragedy. In this case, the death of the 
19 children and 2 adults, at least that is the latest reporting, but 
also indicating that the deaths took place because an armed gunman came 
into a school with body armor protecting him from the response from any 
law enforcement.
  So we have another example, in barely less than a week, where a 
gunman goes into a setting in a grocery store in Buffalo, NY, and now 
into a school where second graders, third graders, and fourth graders 
are killed because he has a high-powered weapon, and he is fully 
protected from any law enforcement or any other response. And we are 
supposed to just get used to this, I guess. That seems to be the 
response here in Washington.
  Now, this isn't a problem of Congress, more broadly, or the executive 
branch of our government. This is a problem--the failure to address 
this problem, even to pass something as simple as background check 
legislation--this is a problem in the Senate of one side. You have got 
50 U.S. Senators who are Republicans who have refused now for years to 
pass anything remotely resembling commonsense gun measures.
  I would support a whole series of bills that we could talk about. We 
don't have time today. But at least the U.S. Senate should be able to 
pass a background check bill supported by 90 percent of the American 
people.
  And you have to ask, why is that? And it is not simply that you have 
so many Republicans who are beholden to the gun lobby. That is obvious. 
That is right in front of us.
  The other problem is--and I think it is related to the question of 
the power of the gun lobby in one party--you have got a whole party 
that seems to want to surrender to this problem, to throw up their 
hands and say: ``There is nothing the most powerful Nation in the world 
can do, nothing at all the most powerful nation in the world can do to 
stop the killing, over and over again, of Americans,'' and especially 
in the context of the horror--the unspeakable horror--yesterday of 
second, third, and fourth graders being gunned down in a manner that is 
so horrific that some of them can't be identified because of the power 
of the weapon and the number of bullets that can be discharged in a 
matter of seconds. So even if law enforcement gets there and isn't 
confronting body armor, no law enforcement is fast enough to get to a 
scene in seconds to prevent a horrific mass shooting.
  So we are supposed to accept the fact, as Americans--I guess this is 
what the Republican position is--that we should surrender to this 
problem. The most powerful Nation in the world can't stop second, 
third, and fourth graders from being murdered in schools. The most 
powerful country in the world, I guess, can't prevent the shooting we 
saw in Buffalo. And you can go down the list of other tragedies.
  This is a uniquely American problem. No other country that is 
similarly situated--has an economy like ours as a country even close to 
what we have--no other country has this problem and has any kind of 
change or reform or action being blocked by one side. And I know there 
is work that has to be done at the State legislative level and all 
that.
  But right here, we could vote this week on a background check bill, 
and it would be supported overwhelmingly.
  But think about this, and I will end with this. Think about if we had 
the same attitude about 9/11. What if someone said right after 9/11: 
``You know what, there is really nothing we can do as Americans to stop 
a foreign terrorist from taking an airplane into a building or crashing 
an airplane into the Pentagon or the plane that went down in 
Pennsylvania. There is nothing we can do about that so we just have to 
get used to that reality of terrorists doing that to our country''? No 
one would say that--then or now. We created an entire new Agency, the 
Department of Homeland Security. And guess what, a lot of those reforms 
that we made to protect Americans against terrorism worked. Just like 
no one said years ago, when we had these viruses and the potential of 
pandemics, that we shouldn't do anything about it even though we have 
the knowledge and the skill to create a vaccine.
  We invested. We did what Americans do--confronted a big problem and 
did something about it.
  What if during World War II, what if everyone stood up and said: 
``You know, the Axis nations are pretty powerful. Those nations are 
pretty powerful. They have the most well-funded, sophisticated armies 
in the world, and there is nothing we can do in 1941 to take on the 
Axis powers''? We didn't say that.
  It is un-American to surrender--to surrender to a problem. Now you 
have an entire political party in this Chamber that has not just 
surrendered to the lobby--that is objectionable and insulting enough--
but they surrendered to the problem; that there is nothing we can do 
about it. That, I would submit, is un-American. And it is about time 
that the Republicans in the Senate begin to be part of the solution to 
do something that Americans do all the time--confronting evil, like we 
did after 9/11; confronting terrorism or disease or whatever it is; and 
in this case to confront gun violence and do something about it, not 
sit around and pretend that there is nothing we can do. That is un-
American.
  We don't surrender. We are Americans. We take on tough problems like 
our entire history has shown. But we haven't taken on this problem.
  What we should be saying to these families, in addition to offering 
our sympathy, is: Your government has failed you. Your government at 
the Federal level and your government at the State level, it has failed 
you. And in this case and in this Chamber it has failed because one 
side will not even entertain the idea of passing any gun measures. They 
have surrendered.
  I yield the floor.

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