Free Republic

Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that if gun reform measures were not passed, “the consequences of failure for our entire democracy are more significant than ever.” Anchor Jake Tapper said, “Does it have to happen this week? Is this do or die week? And would President Biden getting involved in negotiations help?

Angeli Gomez told CBS News that she received a call from law enforcement suggesting that she could face consequences for speaking to media outlets about her experience. --------------- A Uvalde mom who says she was handcuffed by law enforcement while trying to rescue her sons from the school shooting has claimed that authorities warned her not to speak to the media about her experience. Angeli Gomez, a farmworker in Uvalde, spoke to CBS News on Thursday, describing how she was able to rush into Robb Elementary School and save her kids during the shooting that killed 19 children and two...

Editor’s Note: Sadie Fitzpatrick uses this space to explore the character and quirks that make Ocala uniquely wonderful and occasionally irksome. Last night, my toddler insisted on being rocked to sleep. As she settled against my chest, I swayed back and forth, humming a wordless melody. Her hair was damp from the bath, and she still smelled slightly of sunscreen from our day at the pool. In the stillness of the room, I relished the weight of her tiny body on mine. As I marveled at this beautiful human being, I was reminded that there is a more urgent, pressing...

WASHINGTON — In a rare evening address, President Joe Biden on Thursday made an emotional plea to the nation about gun control in the wake of several mass shootings. Biden also asked Congress to take immediate action, saying “Enough, enough.” Read the transcript below: “Memorial Day, this past Monday, Jill and I visited Arlington National Cemetery. As we entered those hallowed grounds, we saw rows and rows of crosses among the rows of headstones and other emblems of belief, honoring those who paid the ultimate price on battlefields around the world. The day before, we visited Uvalde — Uvalde, Texas....

A teacher killed in the Uvalde massacre called her police officer husband for help but he was blocked from entering the school by law enforcement at the scene of the mass shooting, a report says. Fourth-grade teacher Eva Mireles spoke on the phone with her husband, school district police officer Ruben Ruiz, before she was killed by the gunman. “She’s in the classroom and he’s outside. It’s terrifying,” Uvalde County Judge Bill Mitchell told The New York Times after being briefed on it by sheriff’s deputies.

Amid a renewed debate over gun control after the Texas and Buffalo mass shootings, Pennsylvania Republican governor candidate Doug Mastriano is defending and amplifying past comments comparing gun restrictions to policies in Nazi Germany under Adolph Hitler. On May 31, The Forward, an independent Jewish publication, published a story with a video showing Mastriano making the comparison during a 2018 Republican candidates forum for the then-13th Congressional District. “It’s appalling to me anytime there’s a shooting the left will jump on that as a way to advance an agenda to remove our right to bear arms,” Mastriano said. Doug Mastriano...

A Texas lawmaker said Thursday that the school district police chief in charge of the scene at the Uvalde school shooting last week was not informed of the multiple 911 calls made inside the building while the shooter was still inside. State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, D-San Antonio, said during a press conference the Uvalde school district’s police chief, Pete Arredondo, wasn’t made aware of 911 calls that students inside Robb Elementary School made around 30 minutes after the gunman entered, including a student begging for police to take action. The shooter killed 19 students and two teachers during his siege...

Congressman Mondaire Jones (D-NY) warned law-abiding gun owners that Democrats will do everything in their power to ensure AR-15s and similar types of firearms are confiscated during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday. The hearing was to consider H.R. 7910, the "Protecting Our Kids Act," which would raise the legal age to purchase "certain semiautomatic centerfire rifles or semiautomatic centerfire shotguns" from 18 to 21 with "exceptions." The bill will also "modernize the prohibition on untraceable firearms [and] encourage the safe storage of firearms." Jones said Congress will pass gun control legislation and nothing, not the fillibuster in the...

As the deadly school shooting at Robb Elementary School unfolded in Uvalde, Texas, last week, a would-be negotiator was frantically trying to reach the gunman via cellphone from a funeral home across the street, the city's mayor has said. Speaking in an interview with The Washington Post on Wednesday, Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin said he rushed to the Hillcrest Funeral Home after receiving the “first call” that the gunman, 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, had crashed his pickup truck nearby. When he arrived, McLaughlin, a Republican, said he came across an official he identified as "the negotiator." “His main goal was to...

A gunman who killed four people at a Tulsa hospital Wednesday targeted a doctor who had treated him and bought the AR-15-style rifle used in the shooting on the day of the attack, police said. Michael Louis was armed with a rifle, which he had purchased at 2 p.m. Wednesday, and a handgun when he went to St. Francis Hospital shortly before 5 p.m., officials said. He opened fire inside the Natalie Building, killing Dr. Preston Phillips and Dr. Stephanie Husen, receptionist Amanda Glenn and a patient, William Love, police said at a news conference Thursday. Tulsa Police Chief Wendell...

Prokupecz asked Arredondo why he had ordered his officers to wait outside the school while Salvador Ramos, 18, was inside killing 19 kids and two teachers. Arredondo deflected Prokupecz's questions, repeatedly saying that there would be answers once the parents of victims were done grieving. Shortly after confronting the chief, Prokupecz was confronted by a group of Uvalde ISD officers who told him that cops from the Uvalde Police Department were on the way, and that he and his crew would be charged with trespassing if they were still present when they arrived.

Four people were killed Wednesday in a shooting at a Tulsa medical building on a hospital campus, a police captain said. Tulsa Police Department Deputy Chief Eric Dalgleish confirmed the number of dead and said the shooter also was dead, apparently from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. It was unclear what prompted the deadly assault. However, the unidentified gunman carried both a handgun and a rifle during the attack, Dalgleish said. SNIP

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said on Wednesday there is “growing momentum” on gun violence legislation after another bipartisan senators’ meeting on the matter was held earlier that day. “Today a group of eight bipartisan Senators met to continue negotiations on a gun violence bill that can get a broad, bipartisan vote in the Senate. This follows a similar meeting yesterday,” he tweeted. “There is growing momentum to get something done and we agreed on a plan to keep working.”

The Uvalde school shootings, coming as they did just before Memorial Day, have thrown into high relief one of this country's most vexing problems. No, it's not guns, even "military-style" guns, to use a term that has no meaning except apparently to journalists—who should also brush up on the meaning of "semi-automatic" while they're at it but probably won't. Guns have been a part of American society since the Pilgrims shot their first turkeys, and have served the country well throughout its history. That some of them have been used in the commission of crimes by criminals hardly outweighs their...

UVALDE, Tex. — Pedro “Pete” Arredondo sat before the Uvalde school board last year and let members know what the school system police force needed to be ready to face an active shooter. The pandemic had cut into trainings for his six-member department, the chief said, and while officers had completed a program the previous summer, they needed more — as many as possible. “It’s just like golf, if you play once a year, in six months you’re just not all that great,” Arredondo said, according to a video posted on YouTube of the March 2021 meeting. He stressed that...

An exterior door at Robb Elementary School did not lock when it was closed by a teacher shortly before a gunman used it to get inside and kill 19 students and two teachers, leaving investigators searching to determine why, state police said Tuesday. State police initially said a teacher had propped the door open shortly before Salvador Ramos, 18, entered the school in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24. They have now determined that the teacher, who has not been identified, propped the door open with a rock, but then removed the rock and closed the door when she realized there...

The Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District in Texas has its own police department, complete with four officers, a detective and security staff who patrol the campus and its entrances. This didn’t prevent a gunman from killing 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School last week. “The research is clear that more police and hardening schools doesn’t work,” said Patrick Bresette, executive director of the Children’s Defense Fund of Texas. This debate over school police isn’t new, though. Organizers have long pointed out the negative impacts of police in schools: Black and Latino children are more likely to be...

On Tuesday’s broadcast of “MSNBC Prime,” Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) stated that “we saw the seismic increase of carnage across America using automatic weapons” after the Assault Weapons Ban Act expired in 2004 and she thinks that there is support “for a seven-day waiting period for even purchasing an assault weapon if necessary. Because there are other automatic weapons as well.” Jackson Lee said, “I have committed, over the years, having introduced bills dealing with the ban on assault weapons post-2004, as you well know, Ayman, that’s when it ended. And we saw the seismic increase of carnage across...

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) joined with state assembly leaders to announce ten new gun control bills, including a new minimum age and licensing requirement for the purchase of a “semiautomatic rifle.” On May 31, 2022, Hochul tweeted, “New York already has some of the toughest gun laws in the country — but there’s more work to do to keep New Yorkers safe. We are going to strengthen gun laws, give law enforcement tools to prevent crime, & stop the spread of dangerous weapons.”

Gov. Tom Wolf is calling on policymakers to “be open to the things that work” to address gun violence “but we cannot ignore the elephant in the room and that is guns.” During an interview on Pittsburgh-based KDKA radio on Tuesday morning, Wolf reacted to last week’s mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, and a weekend shooting that killed an 18-month-old Pittsburgh boy saying a combination of measures are what he sees as needed.