Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) cosponsored legislation introduced by Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) addressing the issue of gun violence across the United States. The bill sets aside $10 million in funding each year for FY2018-2023 at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to conduct or support research on firearms safety or gun violence prevention.
“Mass shootings in our schools, concert venues, movie theaters and other public places have become more and more frequent in America over the last few decades,” said Cortez Masto. “And as death tolls continue to rise, many unanswered questions remain. The CDC is an important resource for us to understand the epidemic of gun violence happening in our country and how we can prevent more Americans from being killed by gun violence. I urge my colleagues to support this critical legislation as we work in Congress on more common sense gun safety measures to protect our children, friends and family from the epidemic of senseless gun violence that is claiming far too many lives.”
A copy of the legislation can be found HERE.
A 1996 Republican appropriations rider prohibits federal funds from being used to advocate or promote gun control, which some have misconstrued as a ban on funding scientific research into the causes of gun violence. The author of the original rider, former Representative Jay Dickey (R-Ark.) now supports funding Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gun violence research and has stated that the rider should not stand in the way of researching the epidemic of gun violence. In 2016, more than 100 medical and public health groups sent a letter to then-President Obama and House and Senate leadership in support of federal gun violence prevention research.
Senators co-sponsoring the legislation are: Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn,), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Tammy Duckworth(D-Ill.), Bob Casey (D-Penn.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Tom Carper (D-Del.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.).
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