WASHINGTON –
U.S. Senate negotiators reached an agreement Tuesday on a bipartisan bill on gun violence that could potentially lead to final adoption by the end of the week on a growing but important package that will be the response to the Texas and New York Mass Congress. which shook the nation.
Lawmakers released the 80-page bill nine days after agreeing to the plan framework and 29 years after Congress last passed major restrictions on firearms. He overcame an initial procedural hurdle 64-34, with 14 Republicans joining all 48 Democrats and two Allied independents in the vote. This strongly supported Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s DNY forecast for approval later this week. The adoption of the Democrat-led House could follow quickly.
Although Republicans have blocked tougher restrictions demanded by Democrats, the agreement marks a breakthrough in election year on an issue that strongly opposes gun owners and Republican voters in rural areas against urban Democrat supporters of gun control. This makes it one of the hottest battlefields of the cultural war in politics and a sensitive vote for some lawmakers, especially Republicans, who could repel supporters of the Second Amendment.
The legislation will increase checks on the youngest buyers of firearms, require more sellers to carry out checks and increase penalties for arms traffickers. It will also pay money to states and communities to improve school safety and mental health initiatives.
Assistants estimated the measure would cost about $ 15 billion, which Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, a leading Democratic trader, said would be paid in full.
By resolving one last hurdle that delayed the agreement, the bill would ban romantic partners convicted of domestic violence and unmarried of their victims from receiving firearms. Convicted abusers who are married, live with or have children with their victims are no longer allowed to bear arms.
The compromise prohibits weapons for a person who has a “current or recent former relationship with the victim”. This is defined in part as a relationship between people who have or have recently had an ongoing serious relationship of a romantic or intimate nature. “The offender’s ability to possess a weapon can be restored after five years if he has not committed another serious crime.
In another recent dispute, the bill will provide $ 750 million to 19 states and the District of Columbia, which have red flag laws that make it easier to temporarily take firearms from people declared dangerous, and other states with prevention programs of violence. The “red flag” laws that receive the funds will need to have legal procedures in place for the gun owner to fight the removal of the firearm.
The impulse in Congress for arms legislation has a history of declining rapidly after mass shootings. Lawmakers are due to begin a two-week break on July 4 this weekend.
The legislation lacks much more powerful proposals, which US President Joe Biden supports, and Democrats have been unsuccessfully pushing for years, derailed by the Republican opposition. These include banning assault weapons or raising the minimum age for their purchase, banning high-capacity magazines and requiring background checks on almost all arms sales.
However, after 10 black shoppers were killed last month in Buffalo, New York, and 19 children and two teachers died days later in Uwalde, Texas, Democrats and some Republicans decided that this time measured steps were preferable to the usual congressional response to such horrors is stagnation.
Murphy said that after Buffalo and Uwalde, “I saw a level of fear in the faces of the parents and children I spoke to that I had never seen before.” He said his colleagues were also concerned about “not only the safety of their children, but also fears of the government’s ability to rise to this point and do something and do something meaningful”.
That bill, Murphy said, would “save thousands of lives.” Before entering the Senate, his House district included Newtown, Connecticut, where 20 children and six employees were killed in a mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012.
GOP Sen. John Cornin, Texas’s top trader, told the pact: “Some think it’s going too far, others don’t think it’s going far enough. And I understand. That is the nature of compromise. “
But he added: “I believe that the same people who tell us to do something send us a clear message to do what we can to protect our children and communities. I am convinced that this legislation is moving us in a positive direction. “
In a positive sign of his fate, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Voiced support, calling it “a package of popular steps that will help make these horrific incidents less likely while maintaining the rights of the Second Amendment to the law – compliant citizens. “
The National Arms Association, which has spent decades derailing arms control legislation, has expressed opposition. “It doesn’t reach every level. This does little to really tackle violent crime, while opening the door to unnecessary burdens on the exercise of freedom of the Second Amendment by law-abiding gun owners, “said the arms lobby group.
It seemed likely that a majority of Republicans – especially in the House of Representatives – would oppose the law.
Stressing the backlash from Republican lawmakers who support the pact, which will be met by the most hard-line voters, delegates booed Cornin at a Republican congress in his state of Houston on Saturday as he described the proposal.
In another measure of conservative sentiment, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, a potential Republican presidential candidate in 2024, tweeted that the bill “ignores the national crime wave and instead removes the fundamental rights of law-abiding citizens.” Senator Tom Cotton, R-Ark., A possible White House contender, said it would “restrict the freedoms of law-abiding Americans and put too much power in the hands of politicians and political officials.”
The measure will need at least 10 Republican votes to reach the 60-vote threshold that major bills often need 50-50 in the Senate. Cornin told reporters he expects at least 10 Republican votes in favor.
What is uncertain is whether the transition will mark the beginning of slow but gradual action to reduce gun violence, or the culmination of the issue. While Buffalo and Uwalde, the stifling parade of massacres – in venues, including elementary and high schools, prayer houses, military facilities, bars and the Las Vegas Strip – has only led to a stalemate in Washington.
“Thirty years, murder after murder, suicide after suicide, mass shooting after mass shooting, Congress did nothing,” Murphy said. “This week we have a chance to break this 30-year period of silence with a bill that changes our laws in a way that will save thousands of lives.”
The bill will require federal checks on gun buyers between the ages of 18 and 20 to include checking the buyer’s minor files. This can add up to seven more days to the current three-day background check limit.
The suspects in the Buffalo and Uwalde shootings were 18 years old, a profile that corresponds to many recent mass shooters.
There will be hundreds of millions of dollars to expand community behavioral health centers, telemedicine visits for psychiatrists, and training those who respond to deal with people with mental health problems. More than $ 2 billion will be provided to hire and train staff for school mental health services, including $ 300 million to improve school safety.
Congress banned firearms for the 1993 attack in a ban that expired a decade later, the last broad legislation by lawmakers targeting gun violence.
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Associated Press writer Kevin Frecking contributed to this report.
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