In the News

House Republican leaders called for unity and prayer Tuesday after the deadly mass shooting in Las Vegas, but struck down renewed calls to bring forward new legislation to tighten gun laws. U.S. Rep. Jodey Arrington spoke with A-J Media on Monday about the call for tighter gun laws — a debate that inevitably arises in national discussion after mass shootings. And Monday’s shooting was no exception, with a member of the Lubbock-formed Josh Abbott Band — which was in Las Vegas during the shooting — calling for tighter gun control, echoing a chorus of congressional Democrats, pundits and others. Lubbock Republican Arrington said what happened in Las Vegas is heartbreaking, but it shouldn’t bring about a knee-jerk reaction. “What we can’t do is react in such a way that we make it harder for law-abiding citizens to protect themselves and their families,” Arrington said. He referenced what happened to majority whip U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, a Louisiana Republican who was shot in the hip at a GOP congressional baseball team practice in June. Arrington said without armed officers there to take out the shooter, the situation would have been much worse. “I think that we’ve got good laws on the books today,” said Arrington. “You’re never going to be able to stop everybody with evil intent or just flat-out-crazy, who is hellbent on committing this atrocious act. I think the best thing you can do is make sure law-abiding citizens are able to defend themselves when they can. “My core principle is that we have some fundamental, unalienable rights to protect from federal government infringement,” he continued. “Obviously, the Second Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms, is one of those unalienable, fundamental rights.” During a news conference Tuesday, Speaker Paul Ryan said there’s no plan for the House to act soon on a National Rifle Association-backed bill to ease regulations on gun silencers, according to The Associated Press. A House panel had backed the bill last month and lawmakers were expected to move ahead on the measure. “We are all reeling from this horror in Las Vegas,” Ryan said at the news conference. “This is just awful.” The bill is “not scheduled right now. I don’t know when it will be scheduled,” Ryan said. Instead, Ryan and other GOP leaders urged prayers to unify the country and said a positive way to respond to the shooting is to donate blood. Ryan said the actions of the gunman, who killed at least 59 people and wounded hundreds, will not “define us as a country. It’s not who we are.” Ryan’s comments came as Democrats renewed calls for gun safety legislation. Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois, the Senate’s No. 2 Democrat, pushed Congress to pass a universal background check bill and “commonsense gun laws” to help prevent the next mass shooting. “We can’t stop the shootings that have already happened in Las Vegas, Chicago, Roseburg, Oregon, and across the nation. We failed to respond in time for those victims and their families. But if we work together, we can stop shootings in the future,” Durbin said. There’s also been some more surprising calls for tighter laws. Caleb Keeter, Josh Abbott Band guitarist who was at the Las Vegas concert, posted on Twitter Monday that the event changed his views on gun control. “I’ve been a proponent of the 2nd amendment my entire life,” Keeter posted. “Until the events of last night. I cannot express how wrong I was.” Keeter wrote in his post that several crew members had legal firearms but were afraid to access them and become suspects. He said though none of the crew was shot, some crew members were hit by shrapnel. “We need gun control RIGHT. NOW,” Keeter tweeted. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer warned that the GOP-backed silencer bill could have deadly consequences. “One of the few ways the police had to go after this shooter was they could look for the sound, try to hear the sound of where the guns came from,” Schumer said on the Senate floor. “Thank God our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have pulled back on this bill.” Schumer and other Democrats noted that Republicans postponed a hearing on the silencer bill in June when Scalise and others were shot at the baseball practice. “When two mass shootings force you to delay a bill that would make those mass shootings harder to detect and stop, maybe that’s a sign you ought to let go of the bill, once and for all,” Schumer said. Besides the silencer measure, House GOP leaders had been moving forward with a bill to allow people with concealed-carry permits to take their weapons to other states. Arrington is a co-sponsor of this bill and on Monday said he hopes it passes. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., who favors gun control, said Monday it was “time for Congress to get off its --- and do something.” In an outdoor news conference Monday, former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, grievously wounded in a 2011 attack, turned to the Capitol, raised her fist and said, “The nation is counting on you.” But no action was expected, as other mass shootings in Colorado, Connecticut, and Florida, and even the attacks on Gifford and Scalise, failed to unite Congress on any legislative response. A bipartisan bill on background checks failed in the Senate four years ago, and since then Republicans have usually pointed to mental health legislation when questioned about the appropriate congressional response to gun violence. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi on Monday asked Ryan to create a select committee on gun violence to recommend legislation. A group of Democratic lawmakers asked Ryan to remove the silencer bill from the House calendar indefinitely. In an interview with the AP last month, Ryan said Congress needs to fund mental health reforms. “But if you’re saying that this Republican Congress is going to infringe upon Second Amendment rights, we’re not going to do that,” he said. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said lawmakers should remember the good feelings they shared when Scalise returned to the Capitol last week, more than three months after the June 14 shooting. “It’s really a time that we have to heal. It’s really a time to find what divides us” and put it aside, he said. “We need to find that we are stronger. We cannot allow this terror to win.”