gun violence
Following San Jose mass shooting, California Gov. Gavin Newsom asks: 'What the hell is wrong with us?'
In the wake of Wednesday's deadly shooting at a light-rail yard in San Jose, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) again called for stricter gun control policies, asking, "What the hell is going on in the United States of America? What the hell is wrong with us?"
Authorities say a gunman opened fire at the Valley Transportation Authority building during a shift change on Wednesday morning, killing eight and injuring several others; the shooter died by suicide. This was one of the deadliest gun incidents to ever happen in Northern California, Politico reports.
"When are we going to come to grips with this?" Newsom asked during a news conference. "When are we going to put down our arms, literally and figuratively, our politics, the stale rhetoric, finger-pointing, all the hand-wringing, consternation that produces nothing except more fury and frustration, more scenes like this repeated over and over and over again." He said it is time to "take a little damn responsibility, all of us," and "move beyond the platitudes and usual rhetoric" that come after a mass shooting.
President Biden also sent his condolences to the "eight families who will never be whole again," and urged Congress to "take immediate action and heed the call of the American people, including the vast majority of gun owners, to help end this epidemic of gun violence in America." The Associated Press reports that as of early May, in 2021 there have been at least 11 public mass shootings in the United States, with four or more people killed in each incident.