[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Pages 12486-12487]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




  TRANSPORTATION, HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES 
                        APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2014

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of S. 1243, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant bill clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 1243) making appropriations for the Departments 
     of Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development, and 
     related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 
     2014, and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Murray (for Cardin) modified amendment No. 1760, to require 
     the Secretary of Transportation to submit to Congress a 
     report relating to the condition of lane miles and highway 
     bridge deck.
       Coburn amendment No. 1750, to prohibit funds from being 
     directed to Federal employees with unpaid Federal tax 
     liability.
       Coburn amendment No. 1751, to prohibit Federal funding of 
     union activities by Federal employees.
       Coburn amendment No. 1754, to prohibit Federal funds from 
     being used to meet the matching requirements of other Federal 
     programs.
       Murphy amendment No. 1783, to require the Secretary of 
     Transportation to assess the impact on domestic employment of 
     a waiver of the Buy America requirement for Federal-aid 
     highway projects prior to issuing the waiver.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. MURPHY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                              Gun Violence

  Mr. MURPHY. Madam President, let me associate myself with the remarks 
of my colleague from Connecticut, Senator Blumenthal, as well as the 
majority leader, who was here earlier today, and Senator Klobuchar--all 
speaking on behalf of our nominee to head the ATF, as well as Senator 
Blumenthal's remarks on behalf of Fairfield, CT, resident James Comey 
to be the head of the FBI. Very few agencies, other than the ATF and 
the FBI, are more intricately involved in the preservation of the 
health and safety of the American public, and we deserve to have votes 
on those nominees tonight and this week.
  But I also want to associate myself with the other remarks Senator 
Klobuchar made. She talked about our obligation as a body to reverse 
these very damaging sequester cuts to NIH funding for medical research, 
and she listed some very compelling stories about men and women who 
have had their lives saved, preserved, lengthened because of 
discoveries made through medical research.
  It is a reminder to the Senate and to the House--to anyone who treads 
upon these two floors--that we hold life and death in our hands with 
the decisions we make. We decide when we choose to fund or not fund the 
NIH as to whether we are going to give life to people who are waiting 
on those kinds of cures and treatments.
  But, similarly, we make decisions about life and death when we choose 
not to act, when we choose to do nothing, to sit pat. In this case we 
make a decision to allow people to die in this country--specifically 
6,633 people since December 14--when we make a choice to do nothing 
about the scourge of gun violence that continues to plague this Nation.
  I have tried to come down here every single week--as Senator 
Klobuchar did in speaking about the effects of funding medical research 
in very personal terms--to talk about the implications of doing nothing 
when it comes to the increasing levels of gun violence in this country, 
in similarly personal terms.
  December 14, of course, for most people is easily recognized as the 
date when 20 6- and 7-year-olds were killed in Sandy Hook, CT, along 
with 6 adults who cared for them, as well as the gunman and his mother. 
Since that day, 6,633 people have been killed by guns at a rate of 
about 30 a day--the highest of any civilized nation in the world, and 
we do nothing.
  One of those, on July 14, was Horsley Shorter, Jr. Horsley managed a 
Family Dollar store in Tampa, FL. Junior, as he was known, had some 
kids come in occasionally who would try to take things out of the store 
or try to steal. When he had to report them to the police, he would. 
But this was a very gentle man, and more often than not he would pull 
the kids aside and try to talk through things with them to try

[[Page 12487]]

to help them understand what they were doing and what the implications 
were.
  He would never do anything to instigate a fight, his friend said. In 
fact, his last words to one of his coworkers was ``the pen is mightier 
than the sword.''
  What happened that day was an armed robber came into the store and 
demanded money from the clerk. According to police, Shorter was inside 
the office, and he was shot when he ran out to try to help his coworker 
who was at the counter. The robber then forced the clerk at gunpoint 
into the parking lot, where he stole the clerk's car and used it to 
escape. According to one friend, Shorter was very close to that 
coworker, took him under his wing, which was the reason he ran out into 
harm's way to try to save him.
  This friend said:

       I believe that's why that young guy is alive [today]. 
     Junior wasn't going to watch nobody die. He gave his life for 
     him.

  About 2 weeks earlier, on July 2, Chanice Reed, 22, and Annette Reed, 
her mother, as well as Eddie McCuin, a 10-year-old, were shot in a 
triple murder in Fort Worth, TX.
  An hour after the shooter killed his pregnant girlfriend, her mother, 
and her little brother, he walked into the Forest Hill Police 
Department, telling officers to arrest him because he ``did something 
bad.'' He was 22 years old. He had a history of domestic violence. He 
was sentenced to 1 year of deferred adjudication probation because of 
assault.
  Because of a domestic dispute, and because of his easy access to 
guns, in order to resolve this disagreement, he shot his pregnant 
girlfriend, her mother, and her 10-year-old little brother.
  Just a couple days ago, in Bridgeport, CT, Pablo Aquino died. He was 
27 years old. He was described as a ``humble man.'' He was always down 
at the baseball field helping kids because he had a son playing 
baseball there.
  He spent his days at the Fairfield County Hunting Club in Westport, 
where he tended to horses.
  He got into an argument--a simple argument--when the suspect decided 
that the best way to solve this argument was to turn a gun on Pablo, 
killing him.
  The next day, the community had a vigil for him. The vigil was to 
remember him but also because they did not have enough money for a 
funeral. So as the vigil was going on, one of his friends stood out on 
the corner with an empty tin can of iced-tea mix, asking passersby to 
contribute a couple cents for a funeral that was expected to cost 
$2,000.
  Over the July 4 period, there were three shootings in New Haven, CT.
  At around 10:30 on Wednesday night, police said somebody shot and 
killed 19-year-old Errol Marshal. His body was discovered on the front 
porch of a home, pronounced dead at the scene.
  At the same time, investigators found Courtney Jackson, a 26-year-
old, suffering from a gunshot wound to the stomach.
  Brian Gibson, 23, of New Haven, was shot outside of a public housing 
complex shortly thereafter.
  All three shootings were connected. All three shootings are due to 
the fact that too many kids and too many young adults today do not know 
how to resolve their disputes any other way than getting a gun, and 
also because in a city such as New Haven guns are like water; they are 
all over the place. They are all over the place because this body does 
not pass legislation to keep guns out of the hands of criminals. We 
refuse to pass a bill making it a Federal crime to illegally traffic 
guns.
  All those seem very dissimilar from Newtown. But then there are ones 
you hear about that strike you as so similar to the reason why I am 
here today talking about this, because of the 26 people who died at the 
Sandy Hook Elementary School.
  Not much more than a month after Newtown, the Griego family was 
killed, all in one fell swoop, in Albuquerque, NM--Greg, 51; Sarah, 40; 
Zephania, 9; Jael, 5; and Angelina, 2. The parents were killed by their 
son, the little girls and boy killed by their brother. Nehemiah was 15 
years old when he took a semiautomatic weapon to kill his family. Like 
Adam Lanza, the shooter in Newtown, Nehemiah was a troubled teen--more 
troubled than anyone around could have realized. Like Adam Lanza, he 
took out his rage on his family, first killing his mother while she lay 
sleeping in her bed. Like Adam Lanza, he had plans to continue his 
killing spree. He was going to go to the local Wal-Mart before he was 
stopped. He was anticipating getting into a firefight with the police. 
And like Adam Lanza, he used an assault weapon that was readily 
available to him in his own home.
  Greg, 51; Sarah, 40; Zephania, 9; Jael, 5; Angelina, 2--5 of the 
6,633 people--30 or so a day--who have been killed by guns since 
December 14. We are not going to stop them all by passing a piece of 
legislation on the Senate floor. Background checks will not bring 6,600 
people back, nor will a ban on human trafficking, nor will a ban on the 
sale of 30-round magazines or assault weapons. But they will absolutely 
bring some of those people back. They will absolutely lessen the rate 
below 30 a day.
  I am going to continue to come down to the floor week after week to 
tell the stories of victims of gun violence, to give them a voice on 
the floor of the Senate, so that someday, some time, hopefully soon, 
this place will wake up to the fact that we do have responsibility over 
life and death on the floor of the Senate, and it is about time, when 
it comes to the rising incidents of gun violence across this country, 
we do something about it.
  I yield back the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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