This afternoon, news of another mass shooting broke. According to the Gun Violence Archive this is the 11th shooting with ten or more victims this year and the 212th mass shooting in 2022. The details of this horrific incident are continuing to emerge, but several reports have indicated that as many as eighteen children and three adults were murdered and many others injured in the attack.
In Texas, no criminal background check is required for private gun sales including for assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines. In addition, there is no age limit for possessing a firearm, no limit on the number of firearms that can be purchased at one time and gun owners are not required to have a license, register their firearms or report lost and stolen firearms.
Despite many high-profile mass shootings in Texas in recent years, elected officials in Texas continue to disregard the safety of their constituents and fail to pass common sense gun safety laws to reduce easily preventable gun injuries and deaths.
“We installed the large 252’ x 20’ gun violence prevention billboard on the Mass Pike in Boston in 1995. That is over 1 million dead Americans ago from gun violence in the US. We still lose over 100 Americans a day to preventable gun violence. We cannot continue to offer thoughts and prayers when children are being murdered in their schools” said John Rosenthal, founder and chairman of Stop Handgun Violence. “This is on Republicans in Congress and State Houses who choose blood money campaign contributions over human life and public safety. While the shooter’s motives are still unclear, one thing is blatantly obvious: The time for action is now. Congress’s unconscionable priority of guns over lives has resulted in 45,000 killed last year, 212 mass shootings in 2022 so far this year, and eighteen more elementary school children and two adults today.”
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