Christopher Murphy

Mr. MURPHY

Mr. MURPHY. Nobody believes that, no.

Mr. MURPHY. Another qualified right of the Bill of Rights.

Mr. MURPHY. That is certainly the way I remember the events as well. I remember one of the many chilling conversations I had in the 24 hours after the shooting in Newtown. One was with a police officer who remarked that it was a good thing Adam Lanza killed himself and didn't engage in a shoot-out with police because they were not confident they would be able to survive a shoot-out with an individual who had that much ammunition and that kind of high-powered capacity in a firearm. Separate and aside from the question of armor-piercing bullets, law enforcement has stood with us in our calls to restrict the sale of assault-style weapons and high-capacity ammunition because even that, without the armor-piercing bullets, puts them at risk.

Mr. MURPHY. I will yield for a question.

Mr. MURPHY. I yield for a question.

Mr. MURPHY. I thank the Senator for the question. The amendment that has been filed by Senator Feinstein is pretty plain in its wording. It says that the Attorney General can deny the transfer of a firearm based on the totality of circumstances, that the transferee represents a direct threat to public safety based on a reasonable suspicion that the transferee is engaged or has been engaged in conduct constituting, in preparation for, in aid of, or related to terrorism or has provided material support or resources thereof. There is not a single Member coming to this floor and suggesting that people who are on the no-fly list today should be taken off of it because their right to fly has been abridged or that there are names on the list that shouldn't be. That would be ludicrous. No one is going to suggest that we should allow people who meet that criteria to be allowed to fly in this country. So why on Earth would we allow them to purchase a gun? I would hope that our colleagues would take a close look at this language that Senator Feinstein has filed. It is different from her initial amendment. It is very clear and straightforward. If you are deemed to be a potential threat to the United States because of connections to terrorists, you probably shouldn't be buying dangerous assault weapons. I yield for a question.

Mr. MURPHY. I yield to the Senator for a question.

Mr. MURPHY. It will shock and surprise you to know, I say to Senator Whitehouse, that it appears to be the latter. We had one of our colleagues come down to the floor and suggest there is a way out of this; that we could come together and work on a compromise. I think all of us--Senator Booker, Senator Blumenthal, and I--were happy to take them up on that effort. I have noted that we have had 6 months since the failure of the last measure to prevent terrorists or suspected terrorists from buying weapons to work on this. No one in the Republican caucus has approached us about trying to find common ground. It wasn't until we took the floor this morning and shut down the process on this appropriations bill that we started to see movement on the Republican side about coming up with an alternative. Now, they did pose an alternative back in December, but it was a miserable alternative that would require law enforcement to go to court in order to stop someone on the list from getting a weapon and capped them at 72 hours to complete that whole process. It was ridiculous and ludicrous. They are probably going to present another alternative. It is important to note that none of that happened until we took the floor, and we have had 6 months since the last vote, and, frankly, 3 days since the shooting in which we could have been trying to work that out.

Mr. MURPHY. Madam President, I thank the Senator for this question, which is at the center of this moment. This can't just be about the 30- some odd Senators who have taken to the floor over the last 12 hours. And by the way, we have now been on the floor for over 12 hours. This has to be about something bigger. This has to be about a national movement that commands this place to act. It has happened before, and it has to happen here. It means voters have to elevate this issue on their priority list. It means more people have to start asking questions about why their Members of Congress, why their Senators, are voting in a way that is contrary to the vast majority of their constituents. It means everyone in this country deciding not to accept what exists today as the status quo. And let's remind everyone, as Senator Durbin has over and over again, that what exists today is not just a regularity of mass shootings; that prior to 2008, it happened at the pace of one per every 2 months--these are the big shootings--that now happen once every single month. It is also the regularity of gun violence that happens in our cities, such that kids in Hartford, CT, explained to me a year ago that police sirens and ambulance sirens are their lullaby at night because it is just a regular facet of their existence. The American people can't accept that either. Let me just say before I turn the floor over to Senator Merkley how proud I am of all of our colleagues, not just for joining in but for the way in which we have conducted this debate over the last 12 hours. We are angry at a lot of people, but I am really proud that this debate has been on the level and that we have tried to remain as dispassionate as we can about the path forward. Let me add one statistic to the mix. I just heard that my office has received 10,000 phone calls today. I actually have no idea how my office could handle 10,000 phone calls, so I asked to double and triple check that number. We only have two phones up front. But we have apparently received 10,000 phone calls today encouraging all of us to continue on this mission. I appreciate the work that is being done by the staff on the floor. They are staying and laboring extra hours. We know that is not in their job description. This is the professional staff who man the desks and also the political staff within both caucuses and the personal staff. There are a lot of people who didn't know they were going to be staying this late tonight, including those who are reporting our words, and I thank them as well. I want to acknowledge that there is progress being made as we speak on trying to find a path forward. So I want to thank those on both sides of the aisle who are working to try to find a way forward to take these votes. We are hopeful at this hour. We still have more to say, and at this point I will yield for a question to Senator Merkley without relinquishing my right to the floor. (Mr. ROUNDS assumed the Chair.)

Mr. MURPHY. That is the same response we get. I just reflect on one of my earlier responses to Senator Whitehouse, that I have also heard fear in the wake of Sandy Hook from law enforcement about their ability to combat an individual who has staked out in a school or a workplace who doesn't engage in a suicide mission but then tries to confront and take on police, that you have 30-round magazines, 100-round drums. That is very difficult to match from law enforcement's perspective. I yield for additional questions.

Mr. MURPHY. I would be interested in the Senator's reaction when I answer his question, and then he can ask another question to follow up. People are going to say that Connecticut and West Virginia are very different States, and they are. There are a lot of differences between the citizens of Connecticut and West Virginia, but I have found that gun owners aren't that different in the sense that they are serious about their guns. They are serious about being a collector. They are serious about having the right to protect themselves. They are serious about the right to be able to hunt. But they also recognize that it is a responsibility, and you can lose that responsibility if you commit crimes. Almost every single gun owner I have talked to has said, yes, absolutely criminals should not be able to buy guns. And every gun owner in Connecticut that I asked this question to said to me: What? Terrorists, people on the watch list, are allowed to buy guns? So I think as different as our States are, I think gun owners are largely the same in that they come to this issue with the sentiment of not wanting the government to take away their ability to own a firearm, and they want a diversity of products available to them. They want to make sure they are able to collect or hunt, but also they don't want a criminal--somebody convicted of domestic violence, murder, or assault and battery--to be able to get their hands on a weapon. I think that is where both of our gun communities are, and I will yield to the Senator from West Virginia for another question or if he wants to correct me, if I am wrong.

Mr. MURPHY. I thank the Senator for his question. That is exactly why we are here. Let me reiterate the supposition, the premise of his question. Senator Booker, Senator Blumenthal, and I--and I know you share this view as well--just couldn't come back here and debate amendments on the CJS bill that had nothing to do with this epidemic of gun violence witnessed most recently by the worst mass shooting in the history of this country. I simply couldn't come back here and pretend that there is nothing we can do about it because of course we can come together and find a path forward. Yes, we are on the floor demanding a vote because it would be unconscionable to leave this week without having a specific debate on these measures and without trying to find a path forward. I will say to my friend that my greatest hope is that we can find common ground on these measures, but in absence of common ground, in absence of a willingness on behalf of the majority party to actually sit down and negotiate this, then let's have the vote. Then let's have the vote and see where Members of this body stand, up or down. Let's see what Members choose to do a week after the worst mass shooting in the history of this country, when they are proffered with the question: Do you want terrorists to be able to own guns in this country? Do you want individuals who have known connections to terrorist organizations to be able to buy military assault-style weapons? Let's put that question on the floor of the Senate and see what everyone's answer is. I thank the Senator, and I yield to Senator Brown for a question without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. MURPHY. I yield to Senator Baldwin for a question without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. MURPHY. First of all, let me say that it doesn't surprise me because we know the level of carnage that entered that emergency room. But I think it should pain everyone to look at that pair of shoes, look at the blood splattered on them, think of the amount of blood that was lost by those who died and lived, and to think that we are not going to do anything about it. I yield for an additional question. I know the Senator from New York is waiting as well.

Mr. MURPHY. I thank the Senator for his lifelong leadership on this question. I feel as though I am in a caucus of giants here, where people are coming down to the floor--from Senator Durbin to Senator Schumer, to Senator Blumenthal--who have all been working on this issue about firearms, trying to protect Americans from gun violence far longer than I have. Of course, as one of the original authors of the bill, Senator Schumer knows better than anyone that had you known that you were building a bill that would only cover 60 percent of gun sales, you never would have designed it, nor probably voted for it, with the terms that exist today. What has happened is that over time gun sales have migrated to other places. What we are simply trying to do is to reinforce the existing intention of the law. We are not trying to change the law at all. For everybody who voted for that bill originally to make sure criminals were not able to buy guns, they did so because they believed they were going to cover the majority of sales that were done in a commercial atmosphere. Now commerce happens in gun shows and online, and we need for the system to migrate to it. The Senator is also right that protecting America from terrorist attacks is ineffective unless we do both--make sure people on the terrorist watch list can't buy guns and that the forums which that list reaches are both gun stores and gun shows but also Internet sales. Further, the Senator is right that this is the only place where this issue is controversial. This is the only place in which there is a 50- 50 argument over this question. You find any other forum in any other part of the country and it is 90-10 on this issue, which is why my friend from West Virginia has led on this because he knows that in all of our States, this is something that brings Republicans and Democrats and gun owners and nongun owners together. Maybe other things don't, but this issue does. I yield to the Senator from New York for a question.

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. President, when I go to bed at night, I lock the front and the back doors. It doesn't do much good to lock only the back door and leave the front door open or vice versa. That is what we are proposing. If we believe in a commitment to stop individuals who are associated with terrorists from buying guns, then you have to lock both doors. You have to stop them from buying guns when they walk into a brick-and-mortar store, but then you have to acknowledge that it is frankly easier for individuals to just type in one of the main online arms sellers and buy a weapon that way because it is faster, it can get delivered right to your door, and you don't have to go through a background check. If you really want to make a commitment to preventing terrorists from getting guns, then you have to do both. You have to put them on the list and then you have to reconcile the fact that 40 percent of sales today are happening outside of that pathway. By the way, the added benefit of that is that you are shutting down the pathway that criminals have been using for a decade in order to get these weapons, and you will have a dramatic effect on the slaughter that is happening in our cities, as well, by limiting the flow of illegal arms into the cities.

Mr. MURPHY. The Senator is correct. Today, the estimates are that 40 percent of all gun sales happen outside of brick-and-mortar stores. And the secret is out that if you can't get a gun because of your criminal record--or in this case because of your inclusion on the no-fly list-- then just circle back and find another way. All it takes is a quick Internet search. All it takes is to plug in armslist.com, and you can get a weapon delivered to you in short order. If we don't close that loophole--that Internet and gun show loophole--then simply denying terrorists guns at gun stores is a half measure. I yield for a question.

Mr. MURPHY. Senator Kaine, they support it. NRA members support it at the exact same rate that non-gun owners and non-NRA members support it. In fact, NRA members, frankly, have been historically those who have been most supportive of provisions that would prevent guns from getting into the hands of criminals because by and large NRA members are law- abiding gun owners. Historically, they have had some of the greatest concern about this, which is why it is so hard to understand this disconnect between where their members are, where gun owners are, and where the advocacy organization is.

Mr. MURPHY. When you present these issues to the American public, they scratch their heads, or they scratch their heads because they assume already that individuals on the terrorist watch list cannot buy guns. They think it is absurd that we passed a law that subjects toy guns to a greater standard of negligence than real guns. I mean, that is what that law effectively did. That law said that if you sell a toy gun, then you are going to be subject to a higher standard of negligence if that gun misperforms than a gun company is going to be held to if its gun--its real gun--misfires. When you explain that to somebody in your State, whether you are in a red State or a blue State, they scratch their heads. It doesn't make sense to them.

Mr. MURPHY. That is the state of play, I say to Senator Whitehouse. We had Senator Durbin on the floor earlier today, telling the horrific tales of Chicago, for which the strong background check laws in Illinois make almost no difference on the streets of Chicago because the weak background check laws of Indiana allow for individuals to go there and buy guns online or at gun shows and then ferry them back onto the streets of Chicago. So without that Federal law that creates a uniform standard that you need to go through a background check for whatever commercial means you attempt to buy a gun, then there are criminals every single day who are getting their hands on weapons, separate and aside, as the Senator said, from this question of terrorist access.

Mr. MURPHY. I say to Senator Booker, there is nobody better than you in making people understand the human consequences of inaction and the potential for human benefit of action, so I am not going to try to compete. Let me give the statistics. Let me tell my colleagues what happens in States that impose rigorous systems of background checks. There are 64 percent fewer guns trafficked out of State, there are 48 percent fewer firearm suicides, there are 48 percent fewer police killed by handguns, there are 46 percent fewer women who are shot to death by intimate partners, and there are 17 percent fewer aggravated assaults with guns. Those numbers could be even better if there was a national commitment to the same concept because, as Senator Durbin has told us, as tough as Illinois' laws are, all it takes is for a criminal to go across the border into Indiana and buy guns at a gun show or buy them online or get them from an unregulated dealer and bring them back into Chicago. And what every police chief will tell you is that the fewer illegal guns on the street, the fewer crimes there are. The harder you make it for an individual at a moment of passion or a moment of frustration or whatever that moment may be to get a gun, the less likely you are to have a homicide. Senator Blumenthal and I went to a meeting of activists on this issue in Hartford, CT, a few weeks after the Newtown shooting, and they were furious. They were furious that the world had woken up to gun violence because of Newtown after it had been a reality to them for so long. That is the genius of what we are proposing. Without taking away any Second Amendment rights, Senator Booker, we are able with this proposal to both extend protections to Americans who might be the victim of a terror attack but also individuals who right now are living with the everyday slaughter that happens in our cities. I am happy to yield to my friend from Connecticut for a question without relinquishing the floor.

Mr. MURPHY. That is right.

Mr. MURPHY. I think this is a wonderfully simple question which a lot of people are probably asking: What is the problem? Is there a catch? Why isn't there consensus? The simple answer is that there is no catch, and there is no secret agenda. There is no alternative story line. This is about saying that if you are on the terrorist watch list, you shouldn't buy a gun, period, stop. And if you want to buy a gun in a commercial sale, you should prove that you are not a criminal first, period, stop. Those are the only two things that we are asking for a debate and a vote on--no secret agenda, no hidden prefaces. That is it. I thank Senator Donnelly, and I yield to my great friend who has been with us for a majority of the evening here on the floor. He has not yet posed a question. I yield to my friend from Hawaii for a question without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. MURPHY. I thank the Senator for the question. Connecticut is still dealing with this tragedy to this day. Newtown is a community that has not recovered. Connecticut wants us to act not just because they don't understand the inaction of this place but they have seen the benefits of stronger gun laws. Connecticut responded in a bipartisan way. Republicans and Democrats came together and passed legislation to ban major assault weapons and extended background checks to more sales, and we have seen an immediate diminution in the number of gun crimes in our State. We have seen an immediate impact on the safety of residents. So people in Connecticut want us to act because they acted like grown- ups in Connecticut. The minority leader of the State senate, who wanted to run for Governor, put his political future in peril by sitting down at the table and negotiating a compromise. He stands by it today because that compromise saved lives. So the people of Connecticut want us to act, Senator Blumenthal, and that is the reason we are here today. Senator Blumenthal, if I could, I would just note for a moment, before I hand it over to Senator Casey, that when one of our colleagues had a moment to hold the floor for an extended period of time, he read a story to his kids who were at home. I actually didn't know this was going to occur, but my oldest little boy just showed up in the gallery, and, A, you are supposed to be in bed, and, B, I am sorry that I missed pizza night, and, C, I hope that you will understand some day why we are doing this, why we have been standing here for 8 hours trying to fight to make our country a safer and better place, and why, sometimes, even if you don't get everything that you want, trying hard, trying and trying and trying to do the right thing is ultimately just as important as getting the outcome in the end. So go to bed. But this is, for those of us who are parents, deeply personal. This is about protecting not just every kid in this country but our kids personally. I yield to Senator Casey for a question without losing control of the floor.

Mr. MURPHY. I say to Senator Whitehouse, when I was in my early 20s, I actually ruptured two discs in my back, and so I spent a lot of time reworking my back in my later 20s to make sure that wouldn't happen again. That rigorous back work to repair my broken discs is paying off, I would say.