Funerals have begun in Oxford, Michigan, for the four students killed when their 15-year-old classmate opened fire.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, Democracynow.org, the War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman. The funerals have begun in Oxford, Michigan, for the four students killed last week when one of their 15-year-old classmates opened fire in a rampage that also injured six other students and a teacher. The school shooting occurred shortly after the gunman was allowed to return to class after a meeting with school administrators and his parents over concerns he might commit violence. The student has been charged with terrorism and first-degree murder. Authorities have also charged his parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, with involuntary manslaughter. They were arrested Friday after a dramatic manhunt. They were arrested hiding inside an artist’s studio in a Detroit warehouse over the weekend. James Crumbley and his and son went to buy the gun used in the massacre just days beforehand and both parents are accused of giving their son access to a firearm even as he displayed obvious signs he was thinking about committing violent crimes. Republicans have responded to the school shooting by refusing to pass new gun control measures. On Thursday, Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley blocked a bill to expand background checks for gun purchases. He claimed the bill was “hostile toward lawful gun owners and lawful firearms transactions.” Meanwhile, Republican Congressmember Thomas Massie of Kentucky is facing widespread criticism after sharing his family’s holiday photo which shows Massie and his family brandishing military-style rifles in front of a Christmas tree. Massie tweeted the photo Saturday, just four days after the Michigan school massacre. He included a caption reading, “Merry Christmas! P.S., Santa, please bring ammo.” We are joined now by two guests. Nicole Hockley is the cofounder and CEO of Sandy Hook Promise. Nicole is the mother of six-year old Dylan, a first grader killed in the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School almost nine years ago. Kris Brown is also with us, an attorney and the president of Brady, one of the oldest gun violence prevention organizations in the country. We welcome you back to Democracy Now! Thank you so much, both of you, for joining us. I wanted to begin with Kris Brown of Brady. You have a situation now where you have a pro gun control president who is a Democrat, both houses, the Senate and the House are Democratic and have a majority of gun control congressmembers and senators and you have the NRA at its weakest point ever. How is it possible that they cannot get gun control legislation passed and what kind of gun control legislation do you think is necessary at this point? KRIS BROWN: I think it’s a very good question. We have an epidemic of gun violence in this country. We lose 40,000 Americans a year. More than 80,000 more are shot. The tragedy in Michigan just drives home the incredible personal toll that gun violence is taking on too many families across this country. Congress needs to pass a broad array of policies, we need to enforce the law better and we have to reemphasize the importance of responsible gun ownership in this country. But to answer your question, yes, we have a gun violence prevention majority in the House. The Senate has a rule called the filibuster and that rule is killing us. You need 60 votes to get cloture in the Senate and we don’t have, unfortunately, a 60-vote majority around gun violence prevention. That is why we need to end the filibuster if we’re going to get commonsense laws like the Brady Law expansion that Senator Grassley held back for reasons that defy any sense of logic through and save lives. AMY GOODMAN: Nicole Hockley, I can’t even bear to go to you, it is so painful, your loss nine years ago next week, losing your little boy in the Sandy Hook massacre. How old would he have been today? NICOLE HOCKLEY: He would be 15 now but unfortunately he will forever be six because that is when he was killed. AMY GOODMAN: I am going to put the same question to you. You had 20 children killed almost nine years ago at Sandy Hook. Do you see any progress? And if you could respond to everything you saw unfold in Michigan with now the parents of the shooter being charged, which is unusual with involuntary manslaughter. They had bought him this gun, his father, the day after Thanksgiving. When they had the school meeting the day that he opened fire in his school, hours before his parents said they wanted him in class, they didn’t tell the administrators — not clear that the administrators asked — that he had a gun or he had access to a gun. Not clear they knew it was in his backpack. And this horrifying text from his mother to him — “LOL. I’m not mad at you, the only problem is you got caught,” when talking about the teachers turning him in for looking for ammunition on his phone and having pictures of a bloodied body and expressing real alienation and horror when talking about his own pain. NICOLE HOCKLEY: This is a horrible example of activity that happens all too often in America right now. That is why at Sandy Hook Promise we teach children and the adults around them across the country in schools, how do you recognize the warning signs of someone who is at risk of hurting themselves and someone else, and how do you take action and intervene. I think between what the parents did, what the — there’s potentially a systemwide failure here when we look at what the investigation is going to be showing, what might come to light. But it is just heartbreaking to know that this was an absolutely preventable act of violence.
