The Movement That Sandy Hook Built

"More than 500 bills aimed at curbing gun violence have been passed at the local, state, and federal levels -- not to mention the hundreds of gun rights bills that have been defeated."

"Sandy Hook Promise, the nonprofit they founded, pivoted its attention from passing stricter gun laws to training young people how to recognize the signs of someone who might be a risk to themselves and others."

"Some 90% of Americans support universal background checks."

""That's a phrase that would have never been uttered five or ten years ago."To advocate for stricter gun laws before Sandy Hook was to "feel like you were yelling into empty halls," says Christian Heyne, the vice president of policy at Brady."

"The National Rifle Association, the one-time behemoth of gun rights, is hemorrhaging money and sway."

"Instead, "their agenda has been usurped by the right wing and it's used now as an organizing principle to get new people in the door, to get them interested in other issues that don't have anything to do with guns -- abortion and CRT and anti-trans rights.""

"These developments have left some activists questioning whether the movement has been too delicate in how it's framed gun ownership."

"Kimberly Rubio, who lost her daughter Lexi in the shooting, testified before Congress three days before her daughter's funeral to demand an assault weapons ban; she pled with lawmakers as she explained that "a mom is hearing our testimony and thinking to herself, 'I can't even imagine their pain,' not knowing that our reality will one day be hers.""

"The upward trend began in the early 2000s, when gun rights advocates succeeded in convincing the public that firearms made them safer."

"Groups like Giffords, founded by former Arizona congresswoman Gabby Giffords, and Everytown for Gun Safety, founded by former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, dumped millions of dollars into federal races, aided along the way by more tragedies that sent once-purple, vote-rich suburbs into solidly blue territory."

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"The death of her daughter and 19 other first graders at Sandy Hook was supposed to be a "political epiphany," explains Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Co.), who represented Newtown in Congress at the time of the massacre."

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""I kind of assumed that this was more political, that Republicans' feelings on this were more hardened -- not true," Murphy told the Center for American Progress crowd."

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"More Republican senators voted for the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act than they did for any other Biden priority."

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"Murphy paused and smiled."

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"Murphy recalled."

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"President Barack Obama deputized then-Vice President Joe Biden to lead the White House's response."

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"President Barack Obama deputized then-Vice President Joe Biden to lead the White House's response."

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"When his two lead Republican negotiators on the legislation went to share progress with their GOP colleagues, they were met with resistance -- but not the sort of resistance Murphy had anticipated."

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"nnThat a breakthrough came in 2022, advocates say, is a result of their groundwork, encapsulated in an anecdote Murphy conveyed to an audience at the Center for American Progress last Wednesday."

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""We're in a race," Murphy says."

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"The White House celebrated its passage; Manuel Oliver, the father of a student killed at Parkland, spoke for many in the movement when he interrupted the fete, shouting at President Joe Biden from his Rose Garden folding chair: "You have to do more!""

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