[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 14]
[House]
[Page 19600]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             MASS SHOOTINGS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Illinois (Mr. Quigley) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. QUIGLEY. Mr. Speaker, last week's shooting in San Bernardino, 
California, happened to be the second shooting of the day and the 355th 
of the year, equating to more mass shootings than days in the year. The 
social media pages of some of the most influential leaders in Congress 
expressed sympathy, thoughts, and prayers to the victims and their 
families. But what many failed to express was a commitment to act on 
this issue to make mass shootings and horrendous gun violence a far 
less common instance in America.
  While no grand solution exists to end all gun violence, we know from 
the experience of other countries that a combination of small but 
practical policy solutions can severely reduce it. But Congress 
continues to choose inaction.
  Last week, immediately following the devastating news coming out of 
Paris and San Bernardino, a majority of Members blocked the House from 
even debating bipartisan legislation to close the outrageous loophole 
that allows suspects on the FBI's terrorist watch list to buy guns. It 
may be hard for some to believe, but in the U.S., individuals on the 
Federal terrorist watch list are shockingly still not prohibited from 
purchasing firearms.
  Quite simply, Mr. Speaker, this means you can be on the terrorist 
watch list, considered by the Federal Government to be a potential risk 
to the national security of the United States and be prohibited from 
boarding a plane, but still have the ability to walk into any Walmart 
around the country and purchase a semiautomatic weapon.
  Current Federal law prohibits nine categories of dangerous people 
from purchasing or owning firearms; suspected terrorists on FBI watch 
lists, however, are not one of them. I don't have to explain to Members 
of the House the growing terrorist threat that this country is facing 
from lone-wolf extremists which are often unpredictable and incredibly 
difficult to thwart. Even just one unsophisticated lone-wolf extremist 
with a gun can do a remarkable amount of damage.
  This isn't some sort of theoretical threat either. A GAO 
investigation found that individuals on terrorist watch lists 
successfully purchased guns 1,321 times between February 2004 and 
December 2010. And that was before the rise of ISIS and their 
persistent social media campaign to recruit homegrown terrorists.
  Mr. Speaker, I have worked with Congresswoman Lowey in the 
Appropriations Committee on a commonsense amendment to allow the 
Attorney General to deny firearms sales to individuals known or 
suspected to be involved in terrorism. Unfortunately, our attempts to 
pass this amendment in committee have been rebuffed every time. But 
this week, we have an opportunity to change that. This week, we can 
show our enemies, intent on destroying Americans and our way of life, 
that Congress cares more about protecting the safety of its citizens 
than it does about the gun lobby by finally closing this terror gap in 
our gun laws.
  The American people, gun owning and not, overwhelmingly support 
responsible, commonsense gun reforms. If this isn't the definition of 
responsible and commonsense reform, I don't know what is. There is also 
widespread support specifically among gun owners for closing the gap. 
In 2013, a survey found that 80 percent of non-NRA gun owners support 
prohibiting people on the terrorist watch list from obtaining guns. Mr. 
Speaker, 71 percent of NRA gun owners support prohibiting people on 
this watch list from obtaining guns.
  It is naive to think that al Qaeda and ISIS are not paying attention 
to what is happening here in Congress. Fixing this loophole is simple, 
responsible, and the right thing to do for public safety. Let's not 
pass on this critical opportunity to close a dangerous loophole that 
threatens our national security.

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