“People failed. I’m done. They f***king failed our kids again,” said Fred Guttenberg, father of a teen who was killed during the Parkland High School shooting, during an interview Tuesday. “Ok. I’m done, I’ve had it.
How many more times are we going to sit back?”
Guttenberg was speaking with MSNBC in the wake of a mass murder of mostly children at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. As of Wednesday morning, 19 children were confirmed dead at the hands of 18-year-old shooter Salvador Ramos, as well as two teachers. Authorities fatally shot Ramos.
A little over four years ago Nikolas Cruz, then 19 years old, opened fire on Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., with a semi-automatic rifle. He wounded 14 people and killed 17 others, including Guttenberg’s 14-year-old daughter, Jamie.
Nikolas Cruz is still alive. He plead guilty to 17 counts of murder and 17 counts of attempted murder and will face either the death penalty or life in prison without parole for the murder, according to Local 10 News.
According to research from Mother Jones, there have been 129 mass shootings with more than three deaths reported since 1982. So far in 2022, there have been 213 mass shootings (which include fatal and non-fatal incidents) and 10 mass murders with four or more fatalities in the U.S., according to The Gun Violence Archive.
Earlier this month, 18-year-old Payton Gendron killed 10 people in a Buffalo, N.Y., grocery store during a racially-motivated shooting spree.
In 1999, shooters killed 12 students and injured others during the Columbine High School massacre in Colorado. Since then, 185 people have been killed during school assaults and 369 have been injured, according to The Washington Post.
Last year, 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley fatally shot four students at Oxford High School in Michigan.
Around 10 years ago, 20-year-old Adam Lanza killed 28 students and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, a tragedy that mirrors the massacre this week in Uvalde.
“How many more times?” said Guttenberg Tuesday. “I – I don’t – I’m sorry, I’m speechless. I don’t know what to say.”
There were 42 total school shootings reported in the U.S. in 2021, the most in any year since 1999. This year there have already been 24 acts of gun violence on K-12 campuses during the school day, said The Post.
Overall, more than 311,000 children at 331 schools have been exposed to gun violence in the years following Columbine, according to the outlet.
“The ways they politicize guns and violence led us to this day,” Guttenberg told MSNBC Tuesday of the Uvalde shooting.
Even during the COVID-19 pandemic – which kept some people in the U.S. sheltering at home – gun violence surged in the nation, according to the Council on Foreign Relations think tank.
Although the U.S. has just 5% of the world’s population, it has 46% of the world’s civilian-owned guns, according to research cited by the CFR. It has the most firearms per capita and the highest homicide by firearm rate of the world’s developed nations.
In other countries, such as Australia, mass shootings have inspired lawmakers to tighten gun laws.
“The inflection point for modern gun control in Australia was the Port Arthur massacre of 1996,” when a gunman killed 35 people, said the CFR. “Many analysts said these measures were highly effective, citing declines in gun-death rates and gun-related mass killings,” the group said of legislation passed after the shooting.
A 1996 gun-related tragedy in the Scottish town of Dunblane also prompted Britain to pass strict gun laws. According to CFR data, the U.K. had .04 gun related homicides per 100,000 people, compared to 4.12 in the U.S. as of 2019.
“Tomorrow, I’m gonna wake up, we’re going to keep fighting,” said Guttenberg.
Last April, a bill called “Jamie’s Law” in honor of Guttenberg’s daughter was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives.
“This bill establishes background check requirements for the sale and transfer of ammunition,” said a summary of the proposed legislation. “Specifically, the bill prohibits a licensed importer, manufacturer, or dealer from transferring ammunition to an unlicensed individual prior to submitting a background check through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
It also establishes penalties for violations.”
The bill also prohibits ammunition transfer between private parties unless a licensed importer, manufacturer, or dealer first takes possession of the ammunition to conduct a background check, with some exceptions.
A 2019 version of the bill never received a committee vote. The current version has attracted 25 sponsors, all Democrats and it was awaiting a potential vote in the House Judiciary Committee as of last June.
During his interview Tuesday, Guttenberg asked Texas Sen. Ted Cruz for help passing gun control legislation.
“I am begging. Senator Cruz, I sat with you in your office, two years or so ago,” he said. “I listened to your nonsense. I listened to your B.S. I listened to you explain to me why you thought we didn’t need the bare minimum of effective background checks.”
He also blasted the senator – who has received around $300,000 from gun rights donors, according to KHOU – on Twitter.
“Be the Republican who says ‘we’ve’ had enough,’” Guttenberg pleaded.
On social media, he also called on Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to pass gun control legislation.
“People will vote, it is your job to give them something to vote for,” said Guttenberg.
Without action, he fears that more parents like him will find themselves grieving children after dropping them off for a day at school.
“Sadly, the next one that’s going to happen is also predictable – if we keep on doing nothing,” Guttenberg said.
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