WASHINGTON, (Reuters) – Former congresswoman Gabby Giffords, grievously wounded in a 2011 mass shooting, made an emotional plea on Wednesday for Congress to take action to curb U.S. gun violence, but a National Rifle Association executive said new gun laws “have failed in the past and they’ll fail again.”
Speaking haltingly, Giffords implored lawmakers to “be bold, be courageous” as she opened testimony at the first congressional hearing on gun violence since the Dec. 14 massacre in which a gunman shot dead 20 children and six adults at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut.
Responding to outrage across the country following that incident, President Barack Obama and other Democrats have asked Congress to pass the largest package of gun restrictions in decades.
“Speaking is difficult. But I need to say something important,” Giffords, who survived a head wound in an assassination attempt in Tucson, Arizona in which six people were killed and 13 others wounded, told the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“Violence is a big problem. Too many children are dying – too many children. We must do something. It will be hard, but the time is now,” said Giffords, who was accompanied by her husband, former astronaut Mark Kelly. “You must act. Be bold, be courageous. Americans are counting on you.”
Obama’s proposals to curb gun violence include reinstating the U.S. ban on military-style assault weapons, limiting the capacity of ammunition magazines, and more extensive background checks of prospective gun buyers, largely to verify whether they have a history of crime or mental illness.
Witnesses and lawmakers at the hearing agreed on the constitutional right to own guns but clashed over Obama’s proposals, particularly the call for universal background checks for all gun buyers. That is seen as the most likely restriction to gain bipartisan support in a sharply divided Congress.
