House Democrats Are Sitting In, Demanding Gun Vote
By: Stephen Koff, The Plain Dealer
June 22, 2016
Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives staged a sit-in in their Capitol chamber Wednesday to protest Republican leaders' refusal to take up a gun-restriction bill. As of evening, they were still going.
The protest, starting in late morning, was briefly televised on C-SPAN until House leaders ordered cameras turned off by declaring the chamber in recess. But Democrats, led by Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, an icon in the civil rights movement, then used Twitter, Periscope and other social media to spread the news.
"Now is the time for us to find a way to dramatize it, to make it real," Lewis said, according to NBC News. "We have to occupy the floor of the House until there is action."
"No bill, no break," members chanted, a reference to a demand that the House skip its scheduled mid-July recess unless it votes on gun restrictions.
Rep. Jerold Nadler, a New York Democrat, said, "This house is drenched in blood, and we must cleanse it," according to Congressional Quarterly.
Roughly 40 members joined Lewis by late morning, and the number soon doubled, then tripled as more members broke away from hearings taking place elsewhere on Capitol Hill. Ohio Democrats Marcia Fudge of Warrensville Heights, Tim Ryan of Niles (watch his remarks here), Marcy Kaptur of Toledo and Joyce Beatty were among those in the protest.
According to Congressional Quarterly, a memo issued by House Democratic leaders shortly before 1 p.m. said members were encouraged to come sit in "throughout the entire day." By evening, they were still at it.
Democrats said they were frustrated by a refusal of the chamber's leaders to take up legislation that could restrict the right of some people to buy a firearm. This follows the June 12 massacre of 49 people at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, just the latest of mass-killings that sparked demands to make it tougher for some people to legally buy firearms.
The Orlando shooter, Omar Mateen, had at one point been on an FBI watch list for possible ties to terrorists, although he was no longer on it at the time of the shootings.
In the Senate, members on Monday voted on a series of proposed amendments that could have made it harder for people suspected of current and past terrorist ties to buy guns, but each amendment was rejected. Still, the right to even have those votes was won last week when Senate Democrats staged their own filibuster-style protest.
A compromise Senate measure could be offered by the end of this week, allowing gun bans for a narrower group of people.
House Republicans are less willing to consider these measures, saying that the gun-control proposals could infringe on Second Amendment rights.
Senate Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi of California suggested Wednesday that House Democrats might be willing to consider a compromise measure as well, such as one banning people on a no-fly list from buying guns. None of these measures, however, would appear to close loopholes that allow individuals to buy guns from other individuals at gun shows without a background check. Only licensed dealers must submit buyers' names for a check through a national database of felons and others who are barred, under current law, from purchasing firearms.
The majority party controls House proceedings, enabling Republicans to shut off cameras that otherwise would be used by C-SPAN and news networks to broadcast the House protest. But social media, particularly Twitter and Periscope, made a blackout impossible, and Congress members used these and Facebook accounts to keep the protest in the public eye.
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