President Biden announced a new executive order aimed at reducing gun violence by increasing background checks for firearm sales, strengthening “red flag” laws, and holding the gun industry accountable. “It will accelerate and intensify the work to save more lives more quickly,” Biden stated.
Speaking at Monterey Park, where members of the Asian-American community survived yet another mass shooting, President Biden remembered the 10 lives lost after a 72-year-old opened fire at a dance studio during Lunar New Year.
Although the current administration’s long-term commitment to gun control is a step in the right direction, the United States, a country where the leading cause of childhood death is firearm violence, has a long, long way to go until citizens are protected from the horrors of mass shootings.
Congress is a key player – one that has not been cooperating
During his remarks, the President called on Congress to pass legislation that would demand background checks for all firearm sales. “It is just common sense,” said Biden. Research reveals that around 90% of Americans support universal background checks for all firearm purchases.
Still, with Republicans controlling the House of Representatives for at least the next two years, it is expected that this crucial piece of legislation will remain stuck in Congress and far from the President’s desk.
Anti-gun control Republicans believe that background checks will infringe upon one’s gun rights and freedom while taking American citizens’ access to gun ownership.
“You see Democrats and a lot of folks in the media whose immediate solution is to try to restrict the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens,” stated Texan Senator Ted Cruz.
According to President Biden, “every lawful action possible will lead us as close as we can to universal background checks without new legislation.” But will it ever be enough?
As we have seen throughout America’s despicable gun violence history, without universal background checks, firearms can easily fall into dangerous hands.
The “School Shooting Generation” will not stand idly by while gun violence continues to claim lives across the nation.
Ava Ferguson, 18, Bailey Brunning, 18, and Emma Riddle, 18, were seniors at Oxford High School in 2021 when a 15-year-old killed four people during a mass shooting.
A few years later, they went to college at Michigan State University, where a 43-year-old shooter opened fire and took the lives of three students on February 13th.
Gen Z-ers are now experiencing school shootings not only once, but twice
This is the terrifying reality of students in America, and it must be stopped.
“Mass violence has robbed my generation of our childhoods and cut many of our lives short,” noted 25-year-old Congressman Maxwell Frost.
Frost is Gen Z’s light at the end of the tunnel. Being a school shooting survivor himself, America’s youngest representative advocates for a radical and much-needed approach to gun violence. His aims include banning assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, as well as requiring background checks for all gun sales.
Having started his career so early on, Frost has a real opportunity to protect communities from the dangers of America’s gun violence epidemic.
Not only are Gen Z-ers organizing and advocating for gun control, but they are also voting on it. According to a recent Harvard Institute of Politics survey on priority causes for young voters, 22% of respondents said that gun control was either their most important or second most important issue.
Gen Z is the generation that will make universal background checks a reality. As much as Gen Zers might appreciate Biden’s executive orders and approach to gun violence, we recognize that the US has much to achieve still. The question remains: How many lives need to be taken in order for Congress to pass comprehensive gun control legislation?