The tragic school shooting in Parkland, Florida that left 17 dead and 16 more wounded has caused nothing less than a massive gun violence debate across the country.
Shortly after the shooting occurred, Democratic legislators began a full court press of exploiting the shooting, while targeting Republican Senator Marco Rubio and all Republicans as being complicit in the act for their past support of the National Rifle Association, and the belief that Americans had the right to bear arms, any arms.Because Rubio is the lone Republican senator of the state of Florida, and was the recipient of $3 million in NRA sponsored political ads over the years, the proverbial political “target” has stamped on his back.
In the eyes of the anti-gun lobby, Rubio was the boogeyman of the hour. The disdain against Rubio and his 2nd Amendment support was in full display at the sham of a town hall that CNN put on to address the school shooting.
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The national call to ban assault weapons was on by the anti-gun lynch mob, so Rubio had to act quickly to push back against the growing notion that he somehow supported an all-of-the-above NRA gun agenda.
Rubio has teamed up with his colleague in the Senate, Democratic Senator Bill Nelson have proposed their Gun Violence Protection legislation, which according to Rubio’s senate office, is a bill that “will incentivize states to enact gun violence prevention order laws, while ensuring an individual’s right to due process.”
Rubio’s plan to address gun violence includes quite a few measures to help curb the problem, including a ban on bump stocks, strengthen school security, and put in place stricter gun background checks, just to name a few.“In the process of learning about this tragedy in Parkland, one of the things that I learned – that we learned – is that there was really not many tools available to law enforcement or to families when they realize that someone in their home or someone in their community is either a danger to themselves or a danger to others.
And had that tool existed, it is possible that a family member or a member of law enforcement could have gone to a court and gotten a court order by showing probable cause for a temporary one, and then clear and convincing evidence for a permanent one, that this individual was dangerous. That this individual was going to hurt someone. And as a result, not only should they not be allowed to buy guns, but the guns they have and ammunition should be taken away.
And so today we are here to announce our intention to file legislation to encourage states to do what Florida hopefully will do today, and that’s enact their own gun violence protection orders. It would incentivize this through the granting of COPS grants over the next five years. And this grant program, under the Department of Justice, would provide funding assistance to states to implement their own qualifying gun violence protection orders.”–Sen. Marco Rubio