privately and publicly that he shares this passion. So do majorities. Now, in the House and the Senate. And we have a majority leader in the United States Senate who has promised a vote on constitutional common sense gun violence prevention measures. Our opponents are on their heels the NRA, declaring financial and really moral bankruptcy and we have maybe most important, a powerful grassroots movement that has produced results at the polls wins for members of Congress, and that grassroots movement is led by a new generation of groups and individuals. In the midst of the most serious disease outbreak in our lifetime, gun violence is an epidemic in its own right. Guns in the wrong hands. Make the most serious problems, potentially fatal and irreversible. The hate motivated shootings that tore through Atlanta last week, are just the latest example they won't be the last. Without access to a weapon the Atlantic shooter is just a racist and a massage. But armed with a firearm, purchase that very day, he is a monster, a mass murderer, a disturbed man going into a grocery store yesterday. Armed with a weapon of war can kill with the brutal efficiency and speed meant for combat, a domestic abuser, exploiting intimate relationship in violent and horrific ways. When a gun is involved, death becomes five times more likely and a person with suicidal thoughts, who doesn't have access to a firearm can seek help, but with a gun that life can be over in an instant. We need to end this epidemic with a comprehensive nationwide approach expanded background checks, extreme risk laws to prevent suicides mass shootings and hate crime. Protecting domestic violence victims and safe storage standard. These kinds of measures are within our reach. When I asked a mom after Sandy Hook literally a ceremony for her child, whether she would talk to me when she was ready, about action. We could take together. She said, through her tears. I'm ready now. America is ready now. Congress must act. Congress must be ready
now.
Thank you Mr Chairman.
Senator Cruz.
We've had far too many tragedies in our country. Once again we wake up to a horrific act of mass murder. That's lift up in prayer, the families, Boulder, Colorado, families in Atlanta that lost their lives, including the police officer in Boulder, Colorado.
I can tell you in Texas we've seen far too many of these. I was in Santa Fe, the morning of that shooting. Santa Fe High School is less than an hour from my house.
I was in El Paso at the Walmart for yet another senseless mass murder. I was in Dallas where five police officers were murdered by a radical.
I was in Sutherland springs in that beautiful sanctuary where a monster murdered innocent people. I've been to too damn many it's Senator from Connecticut just said, It's time for us to do something. I agree. It is time for us to do something. And every time there's a shooting, we play this ridiculous theater where this committee gets together and proposes a bunch of laws that would do nothing to stop these murders. Senator from Connecticut just said the folks on the other side of the aisle have no solutions. While the Senator from Connecticut knows that is false. And he knows that's false, because Senator Grassley and I together introduced legislation Grassley Cruz targeted at violent criminals targeted at felons targeted at fugitives targeted at those with serious mental disease to stop them from getting firearms to put them in prison, when they try to illegally buy guns. What happens in this committee after every mass shooting is Democrats proposed taking away guns from law abiding citizens because that's their political objective. But what they propose not only does it not reduce crime, it makes it worse, the jurisdictions in this country with the strictest gun control, have among the highest rates of crime and murder when you disarm, law abiding citizens you make them more likely to be victims. If you want to stop these murders, go after the murderers. Grassley Cruz came to a vote on the floor of the Senate in 2013 It got a majority vote on the floor of the Senate 52 senators voted for Grassley Cruz in the Harry Reid Democratic Senate nine Democratic senators voted for Grassley Cruz, the most bipartisan support of any of the comprehensive legislation. So why did it pass into law. Because Democratic senators, including many of the senators in this room including the Senator from Connecticut who just said Republicans have no answers filibustered the law and prevented it from passing demanded 60 votes. If Grassley Cruz had passed into law. Sutherland springs very likely would not have happened. Why is that because the shooter there the murderer there, had a conviction in the air force that the Obama Air Force failed to report to the background check system and Grassley Cruz mandated an audit of all of the convictions to make sure the Background Check database has those felonies in it. Not only that Grassley Cruz mandated that when a felon tries to illegally buy a firearm that the Department of Justice prosecute them. The Department of Justice has a long and I think indefensible practice of not prosecuting felons and fugitives who tried to illegally buy guns. If Grassley Cruz had passed the gun Crimes Task Force that it had created would have charged prosecutors with going after gun criminals locking them up and putting them in prison. That's how we prevent these. Now we will learn in the coming days and weeks. The exact motivation of the murders in Atlanta, and Boulder, Colorado. We'll learn what happened there. But we already know this pattern is predictable, over and over and over again, there are steps we can take to stop these crimes. And you know what the steps aren't the steps aren't disarming law abiding citizens. Every year firearms are used in a defensive capacity to defend women, children, families, roughly a million times a year in the United States. And the Democrats who want to take away the guns from those potential victims would create more victims of crimes, not less. I agree it's a time practice and by the way I don't apologize for thoughts or prayers, I will lift up in prayer, people who are hurting, and I believe in the power of prayer and the contempt of Democrats for prayers is an odd sociological thing. But I also agree thoughts and prayers alone are not enough. We need action today, Chairman Grassley and I are introducing again Grassley Cruz, and I would ask Senate Democrats, including some of our newer colleagues who just got here, not to participate again in the shameful filibuster, that this body engaged in in 2013, let's target the bad guys the felons the fugitives those with mental disease. Let's put them in jail, let's stop them from getting guns, let's not scapegoat innocent law abiding citizens and let's not target their constitutional rights.
