Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords penned an op-ed in the New York Daily News Sunday urging Congress to pass universal background check legislation. Giffords and husband Mark Kelly recently founded Americans for Responsible Solutions to push for gun restriction measures.
“Passing background checks legislation will show the American people that we hear them — that we’re serious about helping them keep their families safer — and that we’re focused on solutions to this overwhelming problem of gun violence,” Giffords wrote.
Giffords wrote about her own struggles to recover from the January 2011 shooting in Tuscon where six people were killed and 12, including Giffords, were wounded. Washington, she wrote, also needs to be this kind of “determination.”
I had to learn to walk again. I had to learn to write and use my iPad with my left hand. I’m still working on regaining my speech; I work every day to get more words back.
Determination guides me every day. And we need to be determined too. Determined to pass background checks legislation — to make it harder for criminals and the dangerously mentally ill to get deadly weapons in the first place.
