Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer plans to force votes on legislation to strengthen background checks for gun purchasers in the wake of a shooting at an elementary school in Texas that left 19 children and two adults dead, though the Uvalde shooter was able to legally obtain the weapon used in the attack.
The New York Times reported that Schumer has moved to clear the way for votes on two bills that would expand criminal background checks to potential gun buyers on the internet and at gun shows and to increase the waiting period for gun buyers flagged by the instant background check system to give the FBI additional time to investigate. Both measures were passed by the House in 2019 but later stalled in the Senate after failing to garner Republican support.
Senator Chris Murphy (D., Conn.) who has become an advocate for gun safety and background check legislation since the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., nearly a decade ago, said he believes there are ten GOP votes to reach a deal that could help Democrats break the 60-vote filibuster to move legislation through the Senate.
"What are we doing?" Murphy said in a speech on the Senate floor on Tuesday. "Why do you spend all this time running for the United States Senate? Why do you go through all the hassle of getting this job, of putting yourself in a position of authority, if your answer is that as the slaughter increases, as our kids run for their lives, we do nothing?"
Yet Senator Mike Rounds (R., S.D.) argued, "it's one thing to say that, regardless of the facts, you should just do something. The question is whether something you would do would actually make a difference."
In the case of the Uvalde shooting and a recent mass shooting at a Buffalo, N.Y., grocery shooting that killed 10 people, the shooters were both able to legally obtain firearms.
The Uvalde shooter, Salvador Ramos, legally purchased two rifles in the days following his 18th birthday, the Houston Chronicle reported. One day after his 18th birthday, he purchased one of the rifles from a federally licensed gun store, which would have required a background check. according to the report. He purchased 375 rounds of ammunition one day later and a second rifle on May 20.
The Buffalo shooting suspect, Payton Gendron, passed a background check before legally buying a Bushmaster XM-15 assault rifle from a gun store in Endicott, N.Y., which he then illegally modified, according to the New York Times.
"He didn't stand out — because if he did, I would've never sold him the gun," the gun store owner told the paper of Gendron.
Meanwhile, an account believed to have belonged to Ramos posted cryptically on Instagram in the days leading up to the shooting, including one post that featured photos of Ramos and a first-person perspective of a person of a person holding a firearm magazine in their lap, the New York Post reported.
The account, which has since been taken down, shared a picture of two rifles laying side-by-side to its stories and tagged another user in the photo. The New York Post reported that the tagged user was a stranger who received a message from Ramos that he “got a lil secret.”
The account messaged the woman who had never met Ramos on May 12 saying, “You gonna repost my gun pics.” On Tuesday morning before the shooting he messaged her, “I’m about to,” but did not elaborate what he meant, saying only that he would tell the woman what he meant before 11.
Ramos lived with his mother, who struggled with addiction, up until a few months before the shooting, when he moved in with his grandmother, a neighbor told the Washington Post. He shot his grandmother before heading to the school to carry out his massacre.
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