Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I have heard my Republican friends tell those of us who want the laws of this country changed to protect our constituents against gun violence that what we should focus on is enforcing the existing law; that we don't need any new laws, all we need to do is focus on enforcing the existing law. Senator Wyden said he wished he had a nickel for every time he has been told our focus should be on background checks. Well, I wish I had a nickel for every time my colleagues told me we should focus on enforcing the existing law. Yet I would also be a rich man if I had a nickel for every time Republicans came to the floor and tried to undermine the existing law, tried to rewrite the existing law to make it harder to enforce it. The Appropriations Act is, on an annual basis, loaded up with riders that hamstring enforcement agencies, don't allow them to actually enforce existing laws. The CRA we have before us today will make it harder for the Federal Government to do what we have told them to do for decades, which is to put dangerous people and people who are seriously mentally ill on the list of those who are prohibited from buying guns. That is the existing law. The existing law says that if you are convicted of a serious crime or you have a serious mental illness and you have gone through a process by which a determination has been made by a government agency as such, that you should not be able to buy a weapon. Why do we have that law on the books?…”