All the while, the country was experiencing more and more and more increasingly horrific single shooter mass killings, gun massacres every year, while it became increasingly impossible to do absolutely anything. In response to them. President obama put joe biden, then Vice President , in charge of leading a task force in the Obama Administration to try to find a way around what could be done. Vice president took charge of that and they moved very, very fast. It was december 14th, 2012, when the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting happened, 26 little kids and teachers and school staff. That was a friday, december 14th. Before the next week was up, the following thursday on december 20th, then Vice President joe biden had already started convening the first meetings in washington. The president asked me to convene this meeting with you and we will be talking with other stakeholders as well, because we have to have a comprehensive way in which to respond to the mass murder of our children, and we saw in connecticut. The president gave me this charge, along with some of our cabinet colleagues here. Youre the first group i wanted to speak with. So what id like to do is the president is absolutely committed to keeping his promise that we will act and we will act in a way that is designed, even if he says we can save one life. We have to take action. There are a number of things you know because ive spoken with you all for so many years and continue that relationship over the past four years that theres some things we can immediately do. Then Vice President joe biden. That was less than a week after the elementary massacre in sandy hook, in december 2012. That was only six days after that happened. That was the first meeting of that task force that he held but then he worked like a whirlwind on it. The pace of it, looking back, is i had forgotten how quickly it moved before i went back and looked at the timeline. Heres how the Washington Post described it. Just the following month, in january 2013. They said in the 33 days after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School, gun control rocketed through what one Administration Official called a time warp, transforming from an issue that was politically off limits to one at the top of obamas agenda. At the center of the transformation was the bidenled task force. It held 22 meetings, most of them in the same week, many of them over two hours long, biden furiously scribbling notes in a black leatherbound spiral notebook. The group collected ideas from 229 organizations. Or as bider put it last week, quote. Reviewing just about every idea that has been written up only to gather dust on some agency. The post continues, quote, the Vice President placed phone calls, too. Including one 45minute talk one night with the parents of a student who died at sandy hook. They said it was like watching a series of Senate Hearings compressed into a week. He was interrogating witnesses, following up, finding common ground, finding discrepancies. Again, thats 33 days after sandy hook happened. In the end, the biden Task Force Meeting incredibly quickly, meeting with everybody from Law Enforcement in that first meeting to clergy to families of gun violence victories to the nra. Biden took an nra groups. He even met with video game manufacturers. All those different people being brought into the discussion at the end of all of it, a month into it, they recommended 23 different actions. To try to increase gun safety, to try to reduce the number of americans being killed by guns. I have no illusions about what were up against or how hard the task is in front of us, but i also have never seen the nations conscience so shaken by what happened in sandy hook. The world has changed and its demanding action. In this context, president asked me to put together along with the cabinet, a set of recommendations about how we should proceed to meet that moral obligation that we have. That moral obligation. That was january 2013. That was just a month after the sandy hook killings. Vice President Biden led this whirlwind, incredibly tense, incredibly intensive process, and at the end of 33 days, had a set of 23 recommendations, from new federal Research Funding to things that can only be done by congress, things that can only be done through legislation. President obama, himself, stood next to President Biden as he explained the recommendations. The president talked about the one single, simplest, smallest thing that could be done by legislation, something with more than 90 support among the American People, something that had massive support, more than 70 support even among members of the nra. Its time for congress to require a universal background check for anyone trying to buy a gun. The law already requires licensed gun dealers to run backed checks and over the last 14 years, that has kept more than 1. 5 million of the wrong people from getting their hands on a gun, but its hard to enforce that law when as many as 40 of all gun purchases are conducted without a background check. Thats not safe, thats not smart, its not fair to responsible gun buyers or sellers. If you want to buy a gun, whether its from a licensed dealer or a private seller, you should at least have to show youre not a felon or somebody legally prohibited from buying one. This is common sense. An overwhelming majority of americans agree with us on a background check, including 70 of the National Rifle associations members, according to one survey. Theres no reason we cant do this. Theres no reason that we cant do this, he says. Theres no reason we cant do it. Except, apparently, even that, we cannot do you might remember how this all unfolded. Youre forgiven if its blurred together during the years because of the way these things resolve. Remember how this happened. After sandy hook, Vice President biden put in charge of a task force which moves with incredible speed to come up with concrete proposals for things that can be done to try to reduce the number of People Killed by guns in this country. President obama proposed what you heard there. Universal background checks, background checks should be run on the buyer anytime anybody wants to buy a gun in this country. 90 plus support for that among the American People. Its simple. You have to have a background check if you want to buy a gun. Thats a simple idea. Overwhelming support, near unanimous support among the American People, but republicans in congress, including republicans in the senate, are not among that 90 plus, apparently and decided they would go for something even lower than that smallest, unambitious simple goal. Conservative joe manchin and pat toomey said they wouldnt pursue, they wouldnt allow the pursuit of a simple rule that there ought to be a background check to buy a gun. Instead, they had their own idea and said they could get it done. They had their own way. They had something that they said they could pass. We wouldnt do more than what 90 of the country wanted to do. But instead do a tiny piece of it, because they said so. So instead of that simple thing, saying you have to have a background check, full shot, manchin and toomey said no, no, we think thats a terrible idea. Were against that. We know that more than 90 of the people are for it, were against it. But our idea is that the law will change to just say you have to have a background check if you buy a gun at a gun show or on the internet. We will only extend background checks that far. Gun show purchases, internet purchases, thats it. It is hard to imagine a smaller reform. But that is what they said they would do. That is what they said they could do. And so the rest of the country, more than 90 just want friggin background checks, full stop, the rest of the country stood back and took very credible senators pursue this rinkeydink tiny reform instead. Because they said that was something they could get done and they failed. They couldnt even get that done, not through the United States senate, not even right after the sandy hook massacre. Joe manchin and pat toomey were convinced and convinced the whole Political Class that they had magic gravitas on this issue to show that the legislative process in the United States senate can be trusted to work to do at least the smallest imaginable thing in an issue of overwhelming public concern. They were wrong. They could not even do that one pitiful thing not in the u. S. Senate. Not with filibuster rules in place that say a majority vote doesnt count. So Nothing Happened in american law. No law change. Not made i through congress. In the final year of his presidency, president obama was still not just expressing regret about that, still not just exhibiting a rare for him show of anger about that. In the final year of his presidency, he was still actively emotional about that years later. Second amendment rights are important. There are other rights that we care about as well. We have to be able to balance them. Because our right to worship freely and safely, that right was denied to christians in charleston, south carolina, and that was denied jews in kansas city and sikhs in oak creek. They had rights, too. Our right to peaceful assembly, that right was robbed from moviegoers in aurora and lafayette. Those rights were stripped from college kids in blacksburg and indonesia. And from High Schoolers in columbine. And from first graders in new town. First graders. And from every family who never imagined that their loved one would be taken from our lives by a bullet from a gun. Every time i think about those kids, it gets me mad. That was president obama in 2016, emotionally reflecting on the fact that even after the murder of all those 6yearolds at sandy hook, even after all those other mass murders of dozens of americans all killed by individual shooters legally armed to the teeth, even with all that, no, the United StatesSenate Insists there can be no changes, no reforms. Joe manchin insisted after sandy hook in 2012 that he was the one that could do it. That i would show that the United States senate was not broken, that it could absolutely do its job on this issue as long as you let someone like him define the job that was to be done. Just as long as you let someone like him lead the way. Just as long as you let somebody like him work with other senators like him who had so much credibility in the gun lobby. We cant do anything more ambitious that what he wants or what they want. Watch what they can do once they finally decide to do on this. People like joe manchin said theres some credibility on this issue, they could get things done things that we all agree should be done. Just watch. The senate can work on this issue when they want to. Just wash. Just put things in the hands of the senators who disagree with 90 plus of the American Public on this. Senators who represent the fringiest, smallest, most hardline ancient paleo politics position on this. Theyre the only ones with credibility on this issue. Theyre the ones who decide whats possible and they will show that the u. S. Senate isnt broken, that things can be done, as long as they decide what those things are. Watch. Everything else stopped. All of that momentum after what happened in this country. After sandy hook. The outflowing of emotion after sandy hook, all of the momentum that was taken by the administration, all of the public desperation to do something. Joe manchin said give that to me. Im the one. Im my way, this is the way well get things done. What we watched today really involved only one piece of what has been a big complex debate about guns and it includes just a few senators. Yet, the impact seems so much larger, in part pause of the emotion that helped make it happen. Driven by their loss. I feel like i carry my daughters spirit when i got into these meetings. I wanted them to hear me as a mother. I asked them if they could please give me something i can tell my son. Surrounded by newtown families to talk about todays breakthrough on background checks but only a whisper could come forth from senator joe manchin. Manchin, a democrat partnered with pat toomey, a republican, both rated by the nra to forge a compromise today. I think the substance of the bill makes a lot of sense. To me, this isnt gun control. This is common sense. Reporter and shopping on the internet, just like those already required when buying from licensed dealers. The law would not affect individuals who buy, sell, or give their weapons to families, friends, or even strangers. This is a right that is so much good. It will prevent people from having a gun who shouldnt have it. He could not get that done. Something thats so right, it does so much good, he couldnt get that done. And now he is insisting that he is the one who has to be trusted with this task again, because he will not allow anybody elses ideas to move forward. The alleged shooter in the boulder, colorado, massacre yesterday was released from the hospital after receiving medical treatment and is now at the Boulder County jail. He was charged with ten counts of murder. He is 21 years old. He was born the same week at the columbine massacre High School Massacre was in 1999. When columbine happened, it felt like the world stopped and it would never start up the same way again. Thirteen People Killed at Columbine High School in 1999. Again, it felt like the biggest news wed know for a decade, right. But the country would continue to have Mass Shootings at actually an accelerating pace. In 2012, just before the sandy hook massacre, it was aurora, colorado, a massacre in a Movie Theater that left people 12 shot and killed. Actually, the colorado experience shows that the joe manchin dont actually do anything plan is not the only option. And when we hear from senators like joe manchin that we can do nothing else, we have to put it in his hands, despite all the ways hes failed in the past, you can look at a state like colorado and say there are other options we could try. At the time of the aurora killings, the governor of colorado was a moderate man, John Hickenlooper. But after aurora, he came to believe that some common sense popular gun reforms with you not only necessary, they were possible and it was bother worth. He announced his support for gun laws in colorado. He announced it in december 2012 just a few days before the sandy hook shooting happened. That of course focused the whole countrys attention, but colorado was already moving. In colorado they did pass new laws. Nothing radical but common sense changes that were very, very popular with the public, including limiting high capacity ammunition magazines and, yes, requiring background checks. The republicans and the gun lobby went nuts and they vowed revenge. They did get some of that. Two Democratic State senators who supported those reforms were recalled from office. Two of them. The year after those gun reforms were signed by governor hickenlooper, the following year 2013 and again in 2016, republicans took control of the Colorado State senate. But in 2014, John Hickenlooper was also elected, and in 2013, democrats won back the Colorado State senate. One incumbent was ousted from his seat. He lost his seat and by a lot to the father of a young man who was killed in the aurora massacre. Gun lobby republicans who had run the recall effort who had supported gun reforms, the gun lobbyists went after representative sullivan as well but their efforts to recall him collapsed and failed. Last year, representative sullivan was just reelected. Colorado is now represented in the United States senate by senator Michael Bennett and senator John Hickenlooper, the former governor. In order to get his seat in the u. S. Senate, senator hickenlooper ousted republican pronra republican senator Corey Gardner last year. Senator hickenlooper and senator bennett said today in the wake of the boulder massacre that they support National Reforms to improve been law and gun pollination wide. A lot of Democratic Senators are saying that today. When you hear that from colorado, senator hickenlooper in particular has at least lived through what it means to not only say that, but to do it. To show, that, yeah, you might rattle some cages when you do it but if youve got a the vast support of the people on your side, it will be viewed as the right thing to do, despite the fact that you will have opposition. And if you do it, theres no guarantee in life. Theres no guarantee in politics that your career will thrive but hicken looper has shown that it can. President biden is calling once again for action from the country. I dont need to wait another minute, let alone an hour, to take common sense steps that will save lives in the future and encourage my colleagues in the house and senate to act. We can ban assault weapons and high capacity magazines in this country once again. I got that done when i was a senator. It passed. It was law for the longest time. And it brought down these mass killings. We should do it again. We can close the loopholes in our background check system, including the charleston loophole. Thats one of the best tools we have right now to preven