Menendez on Mass Shootings: It’s Time for Action

“The President’s remarks consistently raise the level of intolerance in our country and instead of being the great uniter, he is the ultimate divider.”

CAMDEN, N.J. – U.S. Senator Bob Menendez today condemned this weekend’s mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, that killed over 30 people and injured dozens more. Speaking to reporters following an unrelated event in Camden, the Senator outlined several common sense gun safety measures that Congress could immediately take action on if President Trump and Republicans would be willing to take on the NRA and stand with the American people.

“The President and Republicans in Congress are paralyzed by the NRA,” Sen. Menendez said in laying out common sense gun safety measures that Washington should act upon, including universal background checks that would keep guns out of the hands of criminals, domestic abusers and individuals with mental illness, and bans on both high capacity magazines and assault weapons.

“These are the types of measures that can save lives,” he added.

“It’s past time that we do more than offer our thoughts and prayers to all of the victims and their families and communities. It’s time we make them safer,” said the Senator.  “And we can do that.  We just need our colleagues to break away from the shackles of the NRA.”

Further, Sen. Menendez criticized President Trump, saying, that “the President’s remarks consistently raise the level of intolerance in our country and instead of being the great uniter, he is the ultimate divider.”

In June, and as a response to the Virginia Beach mass shooting who killed a dozen innocent people, Sen. Menendez introduced the Help Empower Americans to Respond (HEAR) Act to ban the importation, sale, manufacture, transfer or possession of gun silencers or suppressors.

Earlier this year, Sen. Menendez introduced the Keep Americans Safe Act to high-capacity ban gun magazines that can hold over ten rounds and the Stopping the Traffic in Overseas Proliferation of Ghost Guns Act, which would block the Trump Administration’s efforts to weaken regulations on 3D guns and also cosponsored the Assault Weapons Ban and the Background Check Expansion Act. The senator voted for the original Assault Weapons Ban in 1994 as a member of the House of Representatives.

Sen. Menendez also introduced the 3D Printed Gun Safety Act to prohibit the online distribution of blueprints and instructions that allow for the three dimensional (3D) printing of firearms and has continued to raise attention on social media platforms to stay vigilant on the dissemination of this content.

Sen. Menendez also sponsored legislation that would close the gun show loophole, outlaw “bump stocks” and other devices that make semiautomatic weapons fully automatic, prevent those on the Terror Watch List from purchasing guns, and improve access to mental health and addiction treatment.