Politicians Still Oppose Gun Control After Deadly Spree

Public figures voice support for Second Amendment rights following mass shooting

The gun control debate has resurfaced after a madman Friday killed a dozen moviegoers during a midnight screening of blockbuster “The Dark Knight” at an Aurora, Colo., movie theater. Given that the incident marked one of the country’s deadliest mass shootings ever, one would think that politicians might call for tighter gun control laws. While the Huffington Post reports that New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg intends to “reintroduce legislation that would curtail the ability of a shooter to fire at length without reloading,” a number of other public figures have voiced their support for Second Amendment rights, including the Colorado governor, Think Progress reports. Here’s what they had to say:

Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, told ABC News Sunday that while state officials will reexamine gun control laws, he doesn’t think restrictions on guns would have prevented the mass shooting on Friday. Hickenlooper said, “worry that if we got rid of all the guns — certainly, we have so many guns in this country and we do have a lot more gun violence — but even if he didn’t have access to guns, this guy was diabolical, right? He would have found explosives, he would have found something else, some sort of poisonous gas, something to create this horror.”

Arizona Sen. John McCain, a Republican, did not seem to think that a renewed federal ban on assault weapons would’ve prevented the Colorado massacre, even though such a ban would’ve included one of the guns the shooter used during his spree. He told CNN Sunday, “We had a ban on assault weapons, it didn’t change the situation at all in my view …. To somehow leap to the conclusion that this was somehow caused by the fact that we don’t have more gun control legislation I don’t think has been proved.”

Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, a Republican, told Fox News on Sunday, “People will talk about unusually lethal weapons, that could be potentially a discussion you could have. But the fact of the matter is there are 30-round magazines that are just common. You simply can’t keep these weapons out of the hands of sick, demented individuals who want to do harm. And when you try to do it, you restrict our freedoms.”