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A Senate in the Gun Lobby’s Grip
by GABRIELLE GIFFORDS
April
17, 2013
SENATORS say they fear the
N.R.A. and the gun lobby. But I think that fear must be nothing compared to the
fear the first graders in Sandy Hook Elementary School felt as their lives ended in a hail of bullets.
The fear that those children who survived the massacre must feel every time
they remember their teachers stacking them into closets and bathrooms,
whispering that they loved them, so that love would be the last thing the
students heard if the gunman found them.
On Wednesday, a minority of
senators gave into fear and blocked common-sense legislation that would
have made it harder for criminals and people with dangerous mental illnesses to
get hold of deadly firearms — a bill that could prevent future tragedies like
those in Newtown, Conn., Aurora, Colo., Blacksburg, Va., and too many
communities to count.
Some of the senators who
voted against the background-check amendments have met with grieving parents
whose children were murdered at Sandy Hook, in Newtown. Some of the senators who voted no
have also looked into my eyes as I talked about my experience being shot in the
head at point-blank range in suburban Tucson two years ago, and expressed
sympathy for the 18 other people shot besides me, 6 of whom died. These
senators have heard from their constituents — who polls show overwhelmingly
favored expanding background checks. And still these senators decided to do
nothing. Shame on them.
I watch TV and read the
papers like everyone else. We know what we’re going to hear: vague platitudes
like “tough vote” and “complicated issue.” I was elected six times to represent
southern Arizona,
in the State Legislature and then in Congress. I know what a complicated issue
is; I know what it feels like to take a tough vote. This was neither. These
senators made their decision based on political fear and on cold calculations
about the money of special interests like the National Rifle Association, which
in the last election cycle spent around $25 million on contributions, lobbying
and outside spending.
Speaking is physically
difficult for me. But my feelings are clear: I’m furious. I will not rest until
we have righted the wrong these senators have done, and until we have changed
our laws so we can look parents in the face and say: We are trying to keep your
children safe. We cannot allow the status quo — desperately protected by the
gun lobby so that they can make more money by spreading fear and misinformation
— to go on.
I am asking every reasonable
American to help me tell the truth about the cowardice these senators
demonstrated. I am asking for mothers to stop these lawmakers at the grocery
store and tell them: You’ve lost my vote. I am asking activists to unsubscribe
from these senators’ e-mail lists and to stop giving them money. I’m asking
citizens to go to their offices and say: You’ve disappointed me, and there will
be consequences.
People have told me that I’m
courageous, but I have seen greater courage. Gabe Zimmerman, my friend and
staff member in whose honor we dedicated a room in the United States Capitol
this week, saw me shot in the head and saw the shooter turn his gunfire on
others. Gabe ran toward me as I lay bleeding. Toward gunfire. And then the
gunman shot him, and then Gabe died. His body lay on the pavement in front of
the Safeway for hours.
I have thought a lot about
why Gabe ran toward me when he could have run away. Service was part of his
life, but it was also his job. The senators who voted against background checks
for online and gun-show sales, and those who voted against checks to screen out
would-be gun buyers with mental illness, failed to do their job.
They looked at these most
benign and practical of solutions, offered by moderates from each party, and
then they looked over their shoulder at the powerful, shadowy gun lobby — and
brought shame on themselves and our government itself by choosing to do
nothing.
They will try to hide their
decision behind grand talk, behind willfully false accounts of what the bill
might have done — trust me, I know how politicians talk when they want to
distract you — but their decision was based on a misplaced sense of
self-interest. I say misplaced, because to preserve their dignity and their
legacy, they should have heeded the voices of their constituents. They should
have honored the legacy of the thousands of victims of gun violence and their
families, who have begged for action, not because it would bring their loved
ones back, but so that others might be spared their agony.
This defeat is only the
latest chapter of what I’ve always known would be a long, hard haul. Our
democracy’s history is littered with names we neither remember nor celebrate —
people who stood in the way of progress while protecting the powerful. On
Wednesday, a number of senators voted to join that list.
Mark my words: if we cannot
make our communities safer with the Congress we have now, we will use every
means available to make sure we have a different Congress, one that puts
communities’ interests ahead of the gun lobby’s. To do nothing while others are
in danger is not the American way.
Gabrielle
Giffords,
a Democratic representative from Arizona
from 2007 to 2012, is a founder of Americans for Responsible Solutions, which
focuses on gun violence.
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