On the day the federal government begins enforcing a ban on so-called “bump stocks,” the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on “red flag” gun laws.
As News13’s Washington Correspondent Drew Petrimoulx reported, those would allow law enforcement to confiscate weapons from people who are a threat.
“We’re here today to say enough is enough,” Eve Levenson, a March for Our Lives activist, said.
They said it with 10-foot letters on the lawn of the U.S. Capitol.
They spelled out “your complacency kills us,” a message the March for Our Lives activists repeated during a press conference with lawmakers.
“Mass shootings don’t end until we act,” said Matt Deitsch, March for Our Lives Activist.
The activists are high school and college students who know gun violence too well. They came back to the Capitol one year after the March for Our Lives protest flooded streets in Washington and around the nation. They want congress to pass new laws to stop gun violence.
To drive their message home, they marked 735 mock graves, representing the number of Americans killed by guns every week.
Red and white flowers formed a ‘bull’s eye,’ with a student in the middle.
Jammal Levy helped design the display. He lost his best friend in a school shooting in Parkland, Florida last year.
“There’s a mirror on the face of the student, because each grave could be one of us,” said Levy.
While the activists rallied outside the Capitol, inside, a Senate committee held a hearing on new gun bill. It’s designed to temporarily take away weapons from people found to be at risk of violence.
“There is just too much carnage in our country,” said Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ).
The so called “red flag” laws are already on the books in more than a dozen states. But, despite the passion of gun control advocates like Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy.
“This is an epidemic and a nightmare everywhere in our country,” said Sen. Murphy.
Congress seems unlikely to pass broad policy changes at the federal level.
