Frank Lautenberg: “I rise to introduce the Gun Show Background Check Act of 2008. I am proud to be joined by lead cosponsor Senator Jack…”

“I rise to introduce the Gun Show Background Check Act of 2008. I am proud to be joined by lead cosponsor Senator Jack Reed from Rhode Island, as well as Senators Feinstein, Kennedy, Menendez, Kerry, Schumer, Whitehouse, Inouye, Levin, and Boxer. It was almost 9 years ago, on May 20, 1999, that I stood in this chamber and urged my colleagues to close the gun show loophole once and for all. Barely 1 month earlier, two teenagers had shot and killed 12 students and one teacher at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. None of us will ever forget the horror we felt as we watched students run in fear from a shooting rampage that took the lives of 13 innocent people. Those 13 people never should have died because those teenagers never should have had those guns. Some of the guns were purchased from unlicensed dealers at gun shows. Although the Federal Brady Law requires licensed firearms dealers to conduct background checks before selling guns, a loophole in Federal law allows unlicensed dealers--who make up 20 to 50 percent of all dealers at gun shows--to sell guns without conducting background checks. Because the Columbine killers' guns were bought from unlicensed dealers, they were sold without a single background check being done. A friend who bought them guns said she never would have done it if she had to go through a background check.”