Texas politicians say school personnel should be armed
Congressman Louis Gohmert made controversial comments on FOX news on Sunday when he said that an armed principal might have mitigated the casualties in Friday’s mass shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.
“I wish to God she had had an m-4 in her office, locked up so when she heard gunfire, she pulls it out ... and takes him out and takes his head off before he can kill those precious kids," Gohmert said.
There are many Texas politicians that agree with Gohmert. Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson told KTRH there are good reasons to have armed personnel on campuses.
“I guarantee you that somewhere in this country there is some deranged miscreant watching the coverage of the tragedy in Connecticut, and the seed has been planted that he or she can do that,” Patterson said.
Patterson said that people who disagree with him just don't understand.
“We should get away from the idea that if we prohibit guns from a particular location that we will be safer. That’s not as good idea,” Patterson explained.
John Woods lost is girlfriend in the Virginia Tech shootings of 2007. The University of Texas graduate student is the lead organizer for Students for Gun Free Schools in Texas and told KTRH it's time for tougher laws.
“We’re better than this. We can’t sit back and continue to let this happen to our children,” Woods explained.
Woods said that teachers and guns don't mix.
“When we start talking about arming kindergarten teachers then we’ve stepped into unchartered waters. It would be tough for me to find a kindergarten teacher that would be willing to carry a gun into a classroom,” Woods said.
Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee of Houston called for a bill banning all assault weapons to be passed immediately.
“For over 10 years in many sessions of Congress I have introduced the HR 227, the Child Gun Safety and Gun Access Prevention Act. I have been an advocate for more gun safety laws in America since I have arrived here in Congress. In one year on average, almost 100,000 people in America are shot or killed with a gun. Over a million people have been killed with guns in the United States since 1968. U.S. homicide rates are 6.9 times higher than rates in 22 other populous high-income countries combined, despite similar non-lethal crime and violence rates,” Jackson Lee said in a statement.
“This Congress must rise above partisan politics and now come together to pass these important gun safety laws. The safety of America and its children should be at the forefront when it comes to making these gun safety laws. The politics of outside groups like the NRA should not play a factor when we consider the safety of our citizens. We must also look at gun violence in other cities too such as Chicago where over the last few years a number of school age kids have been killed with guns.
“If there is even one step we can take to save another child, or another parent, or another town, from the grief that has visited Tucson, and Aurora, and Oak Creek, and Oregon and Newtown, and communities from Columbine to Blacksburg before that -- then this Congress surely has an obligation to try,” she said.
Hear the podcast with Matt Patrick and Houston's Morning News as he talks with Woods and State Senator Whitmire:
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