Carolyn Maloney: “I thank my wonderful colleague and dear friend for yielding to me, and I congratulate him on his election to the United…”

“I thank my wonderful colleague and dear friend for yielding to me, and I congratulate him on his election to the United States Senate and for responding so beautifully to his constituents and to all of us in response to the terrible tragedy that happened. After the unfathomable tragedy, there is a growing determination and consensus that there has to be change. We also realize that if there is no change then we are destined to have yet another mass murder. This time, the mass murder was of children--elementary school children, in their school with their teachers--gunned down with an assault weapon. There are too many mass murders in this country. We have more guns per capita than any other country on Earth. If guns made people safer, this country would be very safe, but what we have are innocent people being killed with assault weapons. Now, assault weapons are not used to kill animals, and they're not used in self-defense. These are weapons of war. When we return in January, Senator Feinstein and our colleague Carolyn McCarthy will be reintroducing the assault ban bill; but something we can do right now, before we leave this body, is to pass H.R. 308. We now have, roughly, 150 cosponsors. What this bill would do is ban massacre magazines. These are the large-capacity magazines that can have 100 rounds be limited to 10 rounds. They'd have to stop and reload. That's what saved people in the movie theater: He had to stop; it jammed.…”