On the recordDecember 13, 2023
11 years ago tomorrow, our Nation and the Newtown, CT, community experienced one of the deadliest school shootings in American history. Horror ripped through our hearts as we heard the news. Twenty first grade students and six teachers and staff members gunned down in cold blood inside of Sandy Hook Elementary School. Twenty first graders who right now should be high school seniors, relishing special moments and milestones with their friends. They should be finishing their college applications, taking their driver's tests, and getting measured for their caps and gowns. Their families should be watching them flourish as they become young adults embarking on all the world has to offer. Instead, their lives cruelly cut short, and their family members will never be whole again. Adults who tried desperately to protect their students, albeit in vain, from the Goliath force of an AR-15 style gun. Eleven years ago, we grieved with the families, we cried, and we prayed. Eleven years ago, we said never, never again would we let this happen. Instead, it has happened again and again, over and over-- Parkland, Santa Fe, Michigan State, UNLV, Uvalde. The scenes from Robb Elementary School, where 19 students, mostly third and fourth graders, and their two beloved teachers were gunned down with an assault weapon last year, could not have been more reminiscent of Sandy Hook. The innocent lives wiped out in a spree of mindless violence.…
