Mayor Ed Lee Joins National Campaign Asking Congress for Better Gun Control
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The new campaign, co-chaired by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, urges Congress to pass more stringent legislation requiring background checks for all sales, limit military-level assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, perhaps most importantly, make gun trafficking a federal crime. Mayor Lee joined more than 900 mayors hailing from 45 states and the hell-no-we-won't-go support of 1.4 million grassrooters.
Only 30 of those mayors were featured in the video, and Lee's moments in the spotlight are both fleeting and poignant; he flashes across the screen twice amid a line of solemn faces. The video insists that mayors take responsibility for the "front-line" role they play in combatting the cyclical destruction of gun violence.
"No more consoling families," Lee says dolefully with his mustache twitching, "no more calls in the middle of the night."
The public service announcement calls for more action in the wake of new polls released last week which illustrated overwhelming support for background checks. Among 41 congressional district polls, 89 percent of people said background checks should be necessary to buy (and wield) firearms.
Currently, federal laws states only licensed firearms dealers are required to conduct background checks for potential gun buyers, but according to Guns in America, approximately 40 percent of guns bought in the United States are performed by unlicensed "private sellers," resulting in nearly 6.6 million guns sold without any background checks whatsoever.
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