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Floor Speech
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Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, it seems very appropriate that Senator Murray, our chair of the HELP Committee--she and I--I am the chair of the Finance Committee--often work together on these issues. As Northwest colleagues, we see how serious and how incredibly damaging the last 24 hours have been to our country.
I am going to speak in a few minutes about a Health and Human Services nomination, but I want to pick up where Senator Murray left off with respect to guns and specifically talk about the atrocity--the atrocity--that took place yesterday in Texas.
I think Senators can barely begin to imagine the pain the families in Texas are feeling at this moment. They are living every parent's worst nightmare.
This morning, around the country millions and millions of parents dropped kids off at school, and they were fearful. In a country that we all believe is and must continue to be the greatest country on Earth, parents drop their kids off at school in fear that a gunman would walk into their classrooms and murder them.
Let's think about that.
And it has been going on for decades--decades--in our country. We can remember the sinking, empty feeling after Sandy Hook. For a few days, there was a glimmer of hope that the Senate would do something on a bipartisan basis, but then the other side caved to the gun lobby. Congress has done nothing in response to all this carnage in our schools, in our grocery stores, in our churches. Atrocity after atrocity after atrocity, and yet people still live in fear that their kids are next. They live with hopelessness due to the fact that their elected officials are unwilling to act.
There are no excuses left. This happened in a State that is flooded with guns. There was armed security at the school and still 19 kids and two teachers are dead, still their families are broken. No excuses.
Perhaps that is why I have heard multiple Republicans say today that there is nothing you can do to stop the shootings; that they are just going to happen. That is the way it is. They are going to happen regardless.
I just believe with all my being that is just nonsense, and it is ridiculous coming from so many Senators who haven't lifted a finger to do anything about the violence.
My wife always says I am a glass-half-full guy. I try to be positive, always about bringing the two sides together. But on this issue, I don't know what else to say. The truth is that if we act, then maybe-- maybe--it will be possible to prevent another massacre in another school. That should be enough. That should be enough.
The 100 of us here in the Senate are the ones with the power to act-- not anybody else. It is about us. So, Senators, we have got a choice, either we can choose to act on moral courage or just let the fear and hopelessness win out. As far as I am concerned, if you don't have the moral courage to act here on the Senate floor or at least try to prevent more of these massacres, then you ought to hang it up, go home, and let somebody else have the job.
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