On C-SPAN’s Washington Journal, host John McArdle asked Rep. Don Beyer if gun control was “something on your mind” after the shooting that happened today during a Congressional baseball practice.
McArdle asked, “Any time after a shooting like this, I know you’re somebody who is a strong advocate of more gun control. Is that something on your mind today?”
Beyer answered, “Yeah, although, this is probably the worst possible time to try to make a gun control argument. First of all, it was a rifle, rather than the kinds of things that we’re trying to control. It’ll be interesting to see who the shooter was. So many of these cases are people with mental illness, from the Reagan shooter, through Virginia Tech. And, let’s — I don’t want to characterize it, because we don’t really know, but it may be, especially with a rifle, which is not typically one of the things that’s in the front part of the gun debate, is, how did he buy it and when? But, those are further discussions.”
“We do — I think all of us, Democrat and Republican, would like to see much less gun violence than we have. It’s — I met with the suicide action prevention people yesterday. There’s 22,000 gun deaths a year from suicide — or suicide from guns in America, and that’s about two-thirds of it overall. So, we need to work together to keep trying to find ways to work forward without upsetting the Constitution.”
