[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Pages 9306-9307]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              GUN VIOLENCE

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I rise to speak about the continuing toll 
of gun violence on our Nation and on my home State of Illinois.
  This past week we lost too many Americans, and too many Illinoisans, 
to gunfire. Last Monday, 18-year-old April McDaniel was sitting on her 
porch in Chicago when a masked gunman in a car opened fire, killing 
April and wounding four of her friends. Last Tuesday, four members of 
the Andrus family in Darien, Illinois--including the family's two 
daughters, ages 16 and 22--were shot to death in an apparent murder-
suicide. On Thursday, 19-year-old Robert Allen was killed in a drive-by 
shooting on the South Side of Chicago. And over the weekend, at least 6 
were killed and dozens more were wounded in shootings across the 
Chicago area.
  This senseless violence is devastating personally to the families 
involved, and to all of us. Our thoughts and prayers are with the 
victims and with their families. The sad reality is that gun violence 
continues to be an epidemic in America. Over 11,000 Americans are 
murdered with guns each year. If you count suicides and accidental 
shootings, the death toll from guns rises to more than 31,000 Americans 
each year. We have become almost used to this, haven't we? We hear 
about it every night on the news and we begin to think this is normal. 
But it isn't normal in any country on Earth for so many people to die 
from the use of firearms.
  You can get a sense of this grim toll by reading the daily ``Gun 
Report'' by New York Times columnist Joe Nocera. The report compiles 
news stories about shootings across the nation. For example, 
yesterday's Gun Report describes shootings that took place over the 
weekend. It mentions: a 3-year-old in Columbus, Ohio and a 4-year-old 
in Wichita, Kansas who were hit on Friday by stray bullets; an 18-year-
old girl in Ankeny, Iowa, who was accidentally shot and killed by her 
father on Friday; a 30-minute shooting spree in Omaha, Nebraska on 
Saturday that left two dead and two critically injured; a 76-year-old 
man who shot and killed his 75-year-old wife on Saturday in Cortlandt, 
New York after an argument; and a man who walked into a Catholic church 
in Ogden, Utah and shot his father-in-law in the head during Sunday 
mass. These are just a few of the shootings mentioned in one Gun 
Report. And each new day brings another long list of shootings in 
communities across America. It is appalling.
  Last Friday marked 6 months since the tragedy in Newtown when a 
gunman murdered 20 small children and 6 educators at Sandy Hook 
Elementary School. In the 6 months since that awful day, over 5,000 
more Americans have been killed by gunfire.
  I commend my colleagues from Connecticut, Senator Chris Murphy and 
Senator Richard Blumenthal, who have come to this floor repeatedly to 
call for reforms that will spare other families the tragedy that the 
Newtown families have suffered.
  We need to heed those calls. We cannot simply shrug our shoulders and 
write off this epidemic of gun violence as the cost of living in 
America.
  There is some progress to report when it comes to reducing gun 
violence. Officials at the local and state level are taking proactive 
steps that are showing promising results.
  In Chicago, for example, targeted policing strategies and community-
based violence-prevention efforts have contributed to a 31 percent 
reported decrease in homicides compared to last year. The violence of 
this past week shows that more needs to be done, but this decline in 
killings is positive news. I commend the local officials, including 
Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who are doing everything they can to reduce gun 
violence.
  The General Assembly in Illinois just passed important legislation 
that would mandate background checks for private gun sales and require 
reporting of lost and stolen guns to law enforcement, something we 
failed to do. It should be a national law.
  These are steps that will help keep guns out of the hands of 
criminals and the mentally ill. They will help reduce crime and save 
lives.
  Other States are stepping up as well, with significant reforms passed 
in States like Colorado, New York, Maryland and Connecticut.
  But State action alone is not sufficient. We need to do our part in 
Washington. Too often these guns cross State lines. Too often States 
have weak gun laws next to States with strong gun laws. That is why 
Congress needs to plug the gaping loopholes in our Federal background 
check system

[[Page 9307]]

by passing legislation by Senator Joe Manchin, a conservative Democrat 
from West Virginia, and Senator Patrick Toomey, a conservative Senator 
from Pennsylvania.
  Congress also needs to pass a bill with real teeth to crack down on 
straw purchasing and gun trafficking, a bill that I worked on with 
Senators Leahy, Collins, Gillibrand, and my colleague from Illinois, 
Mark Kirk.
  Members of Congress need to take a stand on the issue of gun safety 
and gun violence. There should be no more hiding behind these empty, 
sham reform proposals written by the gun lobby to accomplish nothing. 
And no more claims that all we need to do is just enforce the laws on 
the books because we know the gun lobby has put loopholes in those laws 
that you can drive a truck through.
  I want to mention a few things Congress should do to help reduce gun 
violence beyond the two items I mentioned. First, I will introduce 
legislation to encourage more crime gun tracing by State and local law 
enforcement. Crime gun tracing is a valuable tool for criminal 
investigations. When a gun is recovered in a crime, a police department 
can ask the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, known 
as the ATF, to trace the crime gun back to its first retail sale. This 
information can help identify criminal suspects and potential gun 
traffickers. When all the crime guns in an area are traced, law 
enforcement can start to define and identify trafficking patterns.
  ATF's crime gun tracing system is easy for law enforcement and it is 
free. Several years ago I reached out and challenged all of the law 
enforcement agencies in Illinois to submit the guns they had seized in 
crimes for tracing through the ATF. I am pleased to report that 388 
Illinois agencies are now using the system called eTRACE but there are 
still thousands and thousands of law enforcement agencies across 
America that are not tracing their crime guns.
  The legislation I am introducing is called the Crime Gun Tracing Act. 
It will require law enforcement agencies that apply for Federal COPS 
grants to report how many crime guns they recovered in the last year 
and how many they submitted for tracing. It will then give a preference 
in COPS grant awards to agencies that traced all the crime guns they 
recovered.
  To be clear, law enforcement agencies should not just sit around and 
wait for a bill to pass before they start tracing crime guns. Tracing 
brings enormous benefits at virtually no cost. Agencies should not wait 
for this bill; they ought to start tracing today if they have not done 
so already. But the reality is many police departments, sheriffs' 
offices, have not been doing this. My bill will create an incentive for 
them to start.
  Let me say something else. The Senate needs to confirm a Director to 
head the ATF. For the record, ATF has never had a Senate-confirmed 
Director. The Senate refused to confirm a Director under President 
George W. Bush and refused the second proposed Director under President 
Obama. Now a third candidate is being considered.
  Since the Director position began requiring Senate confirmation in 
2006, ATF has only had short-term Acting Directors, temporary leaders.
  Whether it is a Republican President or a Democratic President, the 
gun lobby and their friends in the Senate have objected to every 
nominee. It looks as if they are preparing to mount an effort to stop 
the most recent nominee by President Obama, Todd Jones of Minnesota.
  To be effective and accountable, Federal law enforcement agencies 
need Senate-confirmed leadership. But the gun lobby has done everything 
it can to keep this agency leaderless and weak. This is beyond 
hypocritical.
  After the tragedy in Newtown, Mr. Wayne LaPierre of the National 
Rifle Association appeared before our Senate Judiciary Committee and 
said he opposed efforts to close gun loopholes because ``we need to 
enforce the thousands of gun laws that are currently on the books.'' 
Well, the agency that enforces Federal gun laws and refers gun cases 
for Federal prosecution is the ATF. In fact, for the past 15 years 
there has been a provision written in an appropriations bill, a gun 
lobby rider, that prohibits any of ATF's enforcement functions from 
being moved to another agency. So the NRA is making sure that the ATF 
is the only game in town when it comes to enforcing gun laws, and then 
they are making sure it never has a permanent Director.
  I want to put the gun lobby on notice. If we can't get a Senate-
confirmed Director for the ATF, then I am going to move to repeal the 
rider and bring in other Federal agencies with Senate-confirmed 
leadership--such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation--to make sure 
gun laws are enforced effectively in this country. The National Rifle 
Association and the gun lobby cannot have it both ways. They cannot 
complain that the gun laws are not being enforced and then stop any 
effort to put a permanent leader in place at this agency. The gun lobby 
has to make that choice. If they want to enforce gun laws on the books, 
they can work with us to confirm a Director at the ATF. If they want to 
keep blocking the ATF from having a Director, we will have to get other 
agencies involved to make sure laws are enforced. It is that simple.
  In closing, I again extend my sympathy and prayers to the victims and 
families of gun violence. We have to do our part in Washington to put 
an end to this. We haven't had the votes we needed yet, but we should 
not give up. The American people are counting on us to make America 
safer.
  Mr. President, I now ask unanimous consent that my last statement be 
placed in a separate part of the Record.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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