Law-Enforcement Innovate to De-Escalate Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, we are barely 2 months into this new year, and yet we have already had 35 mass shootings, devastating communities across the country.

If only two or three people are killed, it hardly makes national news anymore. We can be sure after every major incident that Republicans will offer their thoughts and prayers and then proceed to obstruct anyone who wants to do anything to increase gun safety.

Instead of addressing the serious tragedy, the illness that plagues our country with gun violence, Republicans today propose a new loophole, a dangerous loophole for so-called less-than-lethal devices. Once they are no longer considered firearms under the Federal definition, protective rules go away. That means no background checks. That means no serial number on the equipment so that the police can trace it if a criminal is using it.

I have great respect for the gentleman from Arizona, but using his example of a woman coming at a police officer with a knife, this bill does nothing for the police officer. He can get full access to less- than-lethal weapons now, but the woman, if she had a mental health problem and was barred from a firearm, she could now go buy one of these less-than-lethal devices.

In fact, it is not just one woman in Arizona. There are 5 million convicted felons in this country. There are 7 million people with mental health conditions. They are all barred from getting a firearm, and this dangerous loophole is designed to ensure that they now will see a giant sign saying, ``Come get your weapon,'' because they no longer will be prohibited from getting one of these weapons, while the police officers, the law enforcement officers across this country, get no benefit. In fact, their job is made more difficult because these weapons can no longer be traced when used by one of these convicted felons who chooses to engage in other criminal activity.

These less-than-lethal devices, as they have been labeled, include tasers. There is one story after another, horrible stories, with details of criminals who have used tasers as they raped and abused their victims.

Beanbag rounds, we had those used in Austin against a number of teenagers. They may be called less than lethal, but these teens required multiple lifesaving surgeries to bring them back to decent health, some with serious disabilities.

With homemade alterations, which can occur with these less-than- lethal weapons, they can become more rapid-fire. They can become much more dangerous and still untraceable weapons.

There are so many things that we could be doing in this Congress concerning gun safety. Mr. Thompson has requested a universal background check--not to deny anyone, but to ensure that someone with a mental health condition or some other condition, someone you do not want getting a gun, to ensure safety through that background check. That has been widely supported by law enforcement.

There is a concern about the weapons of war that are brought onto our streets and kill multiple people. There are a number of reasonable measures that have been advocated by one group after another across this country to make our streets safer and to have parents, when they send their children off to school, know they will come home and won't have to spend all their time fearing the kind of violence that we saw in Uvalde, Texas, that led to the deaths of so many little children.

These are things that Congress could be working on right now. This loophole that will allow more people who should not have a gun because of their criminal history or their mental health condition will allow them to get that weapon. Real public safety means fewer weapons on our streets, not more loopholes.

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