[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 9]
[House]
[Pages 12660-12661]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 GUN VIOLENCE IS A PUBLIC HEALTH CRISIS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Pelosi) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, there is a public health emergency in our 
country. Are you thinking of Zika? Are you thinking of opioids? Yes, 
they are public health emergencies, but there is another ongoing, long-
term public health emergency, and that is gun violence.
  I thank the chair of our task force, Mr. Thompson; Mr. Larson for 
organizing it; the great icon, John Lewis, for galvanizing all of the 
concern in the Congress around this issue; David Cicilline and, of 
course, our distinguished Member we just heard from, Congresswoman 
Clark from Massachusetts, for their leadership.
  Robin Kelly of Illinois has been a champion, and so has Judy Chu. So 
many Members have taken the lead on this issue, as Elizabeth Esty did 
before she was even sworn in in Congress, addressing the concerns at 
Newtown.
  Ninety-one people lose their life to gun violence every day. That is 
not a statistic, that is an outrage. It is a challenge to the 
conscience of our Nation to end Congress' appalling inaction on gun 
violence prevention.
  Across America, communities are standing up, speaking out, and 
lighting the way. A preventable public health crisis is taking the 
lives of our children, our neighbors, and our friends. You would think 
that when the lives of little children in school were taken that that 
would be the end of it, that would end the discussion, and that any 
common ground that we could find to expand the background checks, which 
is not a big thing really, in terms of just including Internet sales 
and gun shows--just expanding what we have, not a big legislative move 
but would make a tremendous difference in saving lives in our country.
  This Congress must hear the voices of those calling for action to 
keep guns out of the wrong hands. And I want to just talk about some of 
the voices that I recently heard when I was in Florida a couple of 
weeks ago. I went to Orlando and visited Pulse, the nightclub where the 
gun violence there took place. It was gun violence, and it was a hate 
crime, which is a deadly combination.
  When I met with the families and some of the survivors there to hear 
their concerns about hate crimes and gun violence, they said to me, 
really to a person, please do something to stop gun violence. As 
consumed as they were with the fact that this was a hate crime, the gun 
violence issue was what each one of them spoke about, that they had 
lost their loved ones.
  These are young people out on a Saturday night. One mom who went 
there to take her son to see his friends and the rest and make sure he 
was safe, the mom died, and the son survived. Any mom would prefer that 
outcome, but why does that have to be the choice?
  So here they are: if you are in kindergarten, if you are in the movie 
theater, or if you are in church praying, as was referenced by our 
colleagues about South Carolina--that was a hate crime, too. The awful 
statements made by the perpetrator of that crime where he exploited the 
hospitality that was extended to him to pray together, and then for him 
to make his hateful remarks, racist remarks, and then do violence on 
the people who had welcomed him to pray with them.
  So where is it that people are safe? What can we do to make a 
difference?
  Well, for one thing, if you are too dangerous to fly, you should be 
too dangerous to buy a gun. Eighty to 90 percent of the American people 
subscribe to that. That shouldn't be controversial in the Congress.
  We are supposed to be Representatives representing the will of the 
people. And where there is consensus--we have enough disagreement, but 
where there is consensus, a public health emergency, and loss of life, 
even to little children, people in church, young people out on the 
town, people going to the movies, what is it that our colleagues don't 
understand?

                              {time}  1045

  What is it that our colleagues don't understand? In addition to 
keeping guns out of the hands of those who are too dangerous to fly, 
our Nation depends on keeping guns out of the hands of those who 
shouldn't have them, again, just simply expanding to gun

[[Page 12661]]

shows and Internet sales. Yet House Republicans won't even give the 
American people a vote.
  Give us a vote and see how it goes. What are you afraid of? Are you 
afraid? Are you afraid that the American people will be done and that 
we will have a successful vote on no fly, no buy, strengthening our 
background check system?
  So we are going to be leaving soon. Before we left for the summer, 
under the leadership of our distinguished leader, whom we all consider 
a privilege to call colleague, John Lewis, there was a sit-in on the 
floor of this House that reverberated across the country. Then we left. 
Congress shut down and we left.
  We are about to do so again, but we have a little time. We have a 
little time to save lives. What more important thing does any of us 
have to do than to stay here and pass a law to save lives? If somebody 
said to you: You could save 90 lives by passing a bill today, wouldn't 
you do that? Or, why wouldn't you do that? Why wouldn't you do that?
  It is really quite a sad thing when people go to the movies--as my 
colleague, Mr. Israel, keeps pointing out. When they go to the movies, 
usually they are concerned about are they going to be able to get their 
popcorn and their whatever in time to get a seat in the theater. Now 
they want to know where the nearest exit is when they go to the 
theater. What is that about?
  Some people say it is about politics and it is just too politically 
dangerous for some of our colleagues to vote for the simple expansion 
of the background check legislation and passing no fly, no buy. It is 
politically dangerous to them. Whose political survival is more 
important than the lives of these children, of those people in church, 
and of those young people out on a Saturday night, people going to the 
movies? Whose political survival is more important than protecting the 
American people? That is the oath we take, to protect and defend, 
whether it is the Constitution, whether it is protecting our country's 
national security, our neighborhood security, or our personal security.
  So let's honor our oath of office. Let us honor our sense of 
responsibility. Let us respond to those moms and family members and 
survivors from polls that said: Why? Why are you not passing 
legislation in the House of Representatives to prevent gun violence, to 
save lives--to save lives?
  So, in any case, I think it is really important. I thank Mr. Larson 
for, again, bringing us together. We are not going away. This will go 
on and go on and go on until we disarm hate. We are here to save lives 
here and across the country. We are not going to stop until we enact 
gun violence prevention laws. We are not going to stop until we get the 
job done.
  Again, I thank our leaders on this important issue. I thank the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Thompson) for his leadership for years 
now on this subject. Again, hopefully, it won't be too long before our 
colleagues see the light and decide that their political survival is 
not more important than the survival of little children in first grade.

                          ____________________