Truth with Math

Floor Speech

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Ms. KELLY of Illinois. Gun violence does not need to occur inside a school to harm our children. The stress from living in a community impacted by gun violence has been proven to lower test scores and increase mental health conditions like anxiety and PTSD.

Just last week, I was in a place called Danville in the central Illinois part of my district with 25 young people. The stories I heard were devastating. One young man talked about how two brothers and his father were killed because of gun violence.

Just last week alone, there were 42 shootings in Chicago--a 15-year- old was shot in a park, a 14-year-old was shot while he was riding in a car, and an 8-year-old--think about that, 8 years old--was shot just walking on a sidewalk.

I am so happy that Congress has begun to make progress to combat this public health crisis. We got the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act done, the first time in 30 years that Congress took meaningful action on gun violence.

On August 31, Attorney General Merrick Garland directed the ATF to comply with the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act's licensing requirements for gun sellers. We have made progress, but there is so much more to do.

Democrats are prepared to take these next steps. The American people, young people, are asking us to deliver. We put people over politics when we passed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. We can and must do more. We cannot afford to wait.

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