Thirty-nine mass shootings have taken place throughout the U.S. this month alone, based on Gun Violence Archive.
A gunman killed at the very least seven folks within the small California metropolis of Half Moon Bay on Monday, the second mass capturing within the state in three days and one in all nearly 40 which have occurred because the begin of the brand new yr — a rolling epidemic of violence that Congress has repeatedly met with inaction or insufficient compromises with gun lobby-backed Republicans.
The Related Press reported that police “arrested a suspect in Monday’s shootings, 67-year-old Chunli Zhao, after they discovered him in his automotive within the parking zone of a sheriff’s substation.” Officers discovered a semi-automatic handgun within the suspect’s automobile.
“4 folks have been discovered useless and a fifth injured from gunshot wounds at a farm, and officers discovered three different folks killed at one other location a number of miles away,” AP famous. “Officers imagine Zhao is a employee at one of many amenities and that the victims have been staff as effectively.”
The lethal shootings at two separate places on Monday got here after a gunman massacred 11 folks in Monterey Park, California on Saturday. Investigators reportedly collected greater than 40 bullet casings on the dance studio the place the mass capturing occurred. The gunman, 72-year-old Huu Can Tran — who took his personal life — had previously been arrested for illegal possession of a firearm.
Police said the gunman used a semi-automatic pistol with an “prolonged large-capacity journal.”
“It’s not clear how the shooter obtained the gun, which was a Cobray M11 9mm semi-automatic weapon suitable with 30-round magazines,” Vox’s Nicole Narea wrote Monday. “It’s additionally not clear whether or not the shooter legally obtained a second weapon recovered from inside his van—a handgun that he used to fatally shoot himself. The second weapon could be purchased in California; the primary has been banned within the state for greater than three a long time.
“That the semi-automatic weapon is at the moment unlawful within the state makes California uncommon; such weapons could be legally bought within the majority of the U.S.,” Narea noticed. “And that’s led California politicians to name not only for stronger legal guidelines within the state, however throughout the U.S.”
The most recent string of mass shootings sparked an all-too-familiar outpouring of grief and anger, the latter directed at lawmakers who refuse to assist basic and popular gun-safety measures, prioritizing the pursuits of profit-seeking gun producers and lobbying teams that assist bankroll their political campaigns.
“Each time you vote for a lawmaker who opposes gun security, you’re voting for insurance policies that make it extra seemingly your beloved might be slaughtered,” Shannon Watts, founding father of the gun management advocacy group Mothers Demand Motion, said late Monday, pointing to different latest shootings in Des Moines, Iowa and Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
In line with the Gun Violence Archive, 39 mass shootings have taken place throughout the USA this month alone, leaving 70 useless and dozens extra injured.
“What sort of nation are we going to be?” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the highest Democrat on the Home Oversight Committee, asked late Monday. “It is a nationwide emergency and Congress should act this week.”
However with Republicans in command of the Home and the Senate intently divided, any substantial legislative motion on gun violence is unlikely.
Final yr, within the wake of a bloodbath at an elementary college in Uvalde, Texas, President Joe Biden signed into legislation a bipartisan measure that features expanded background checks and incentives for states to enact red flag laws. Gun management advocates slammed the bill as “crumbs” and demanded far more — from common background checks to a ban on assault weapons.
On Monday, a gaggle of Democratic lawmakers introduced laws that might “ban the sale, switch, manufacture, and importation of military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines and different high-capacity ammunition feeding gadgets.”
“It’s far previous time to reenact an assault weapons ban and get these weapons of warfare out of our communities,” Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) mentioned in a press release. “We handed the assault weapons ban within the Home final yr with bipartisan assist, which was then blocked by Senate Republicans. We have to come collectively to enact this commonsense, efficient, and confirmed coverage to scale back gun violence and save lives.”
