Statement from Vice President Joe Biden Two Years After the Mass Shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

Two years ago, 17 innocent people were gunned down and 17 more injured by a shooter with an AR-15 style weapon at a high school in Parkland, Florida. Just over four months earlier in Las Vegas, 58 concert goers were slaughtered and hundreds more were injured in minutes by a shooter with an arsenal that included AR-15s modified with bump stocks.

We have a problem with guns in this country, and the reason we do not act is simple: cowardice. Political cowardice from the very people who should be fighting the hardest to protect us but instead are picking the side of gun manufacturers and the National Rifle Association.

Every day in America, an average of 100 people die because of a gun. Some of their names make national headlines, others do not. Each one is a life ripped from a family and community; each a future of unknowable potential snuffed out. And, every day that we do nothing in response, it is an insult to the innumerable lives across this nation that have been forever shattered by gun violence.

I have fought for sensible gun safety laws for decades and will do so every day as president. I have stood up to the gun lobby and the NRA, and I have beaten them — twice. It wasn’t easy, but because we did it before, I know we can do it again. Despite the fierce lobbying efforts of the NRA, we got the Brady Bill passed, creating the background check system that today has kept three million guns out of dangerous hands. Now we need to require background checks for every single gun sale, including at gun shows and online. We got assault weapons and high-capacity magazines banned for 10 years in this country. We need to do it again and institute a buy-back program to get AR-15s and other weapons of war out of our communities. And, we need to undo one of the biggest concessions to special interests ever made in Washington — the immunity that today protects gun manufacturers from being held accountable in courts for the carnage inflicted with their products.

Since the tragedy in Parkland, student activists and bereaved parents like Fred Guttenberg have joined other survivors of gun violence and family members of victims to turn their tragedy into purpose, in the hope that no other family will have to endure what they have suffered. It’s time we had a president in the White House who will have their backs.

That’s the kind of leadership we owe to all those we have lost, and to the lives we can still save.