Maloney calls for federal action on gun violence
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U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney shared new legislation aimed at reducing gun violence while visiting the Queensbridge Houses on Thursday, Feb. 10, 2022. Eagle photo by Jacob Kaye
By Jacob Kaye
Last summer, Stephanie Chauncey and Rep. Carolyn Maloney were walking through the grounds of the Queensbridge Houses when they saw a young man who had been shot to death lying beneath a car.
“It's just a crisis,” said Chauncey, who serves as a member of the Queensbridge Tenants Association. “We're having to face it as a community at home, and we don't know what to do.”
Maloney, Chauncey and several other anti-gun violence advocates gathered in Queensbridge Thursday to call for federal action in reducing the city’s recent uptick in gun-related incidents. Shootings have seen an uptick in the past year – citywide, they’ve risen by nearly 30 percent. In the 114th Precinct, which patrols Queensbridge, they’ve decreased – there has been one shooting in 2022, compared to two at this point last year, according to NYPD statistics.
However, Chauncey and others say that doesn’t reflect the situation on the ground, where residents are worried about the gun violence that has seen two NYPD officers recently killed, in addition to a number of young people and bystanders.
“The gun activity in this community has become outrageous,” she said.
Maloney laid out a number of legislative proposals aimed at cutting of the flow of guns up the East Coast, known as the Iron Pipeline, as well as going after gun traffickers and closing gun purchasing loopholes.
On Thursday, Maloney said that she’d soon introduce the Preventing Pretrial Gun Purchases Act in Congress. The bill would amend federal gun laws to make it so the National Instant Criminal Background Check System would flag and prevent gun sales to a person out on pretrial release, keeping “guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them in the first place,” Maloney said.
“In too many cases, individuals have used pretrial order loopholes to circumvent laws to get their hands on weapons,” Maloney said. “In one case, one man purchased over 30 firearms and 500 rounds of armor-piercing ammunition while under indictment and awaiting trial for his participation in the January 6 Capitol Insurrection.”
“My bill would close this loophole,” she added.
The congressional representative was joined by a number of national anti-gun violence activists, including Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter was killed by Nicholas Cruz during a mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, four years ago Monday.
“If you would have told me four years ago, when she was killed, that we would now be in a position where we have a Congress that is passing gun safety legislation, a president who was ready to sign that legislation and a Senate that is at 50/50, really close, like two votes away, I would have said to you, that's crazy, that will never ever happen,” Guttenberg said. “And here we are – I want everyone to know we are closer than we have ever been in this country to passing gun safety legislation.”
“But we are also closer than we've ever been to permanently losing the chance to do so,” he added.
President Joe Biden commented on that viability during his trip to New York last week, where he too visited Queensbridge to see the work of violence interrupters. While Biden and a number of New York’s congressional delegation advocated for the passage of nation gun safety laws, they also acknowledged the difficulty of doing so with a Republican Party unlikely to budge on the issue.
Maloney said Thursday that she feels a lot of her gun legislation is “common sense” and that it’s worth trying.
“One thing's for sure – you're not going to pass anything if you don't try,” the congressional representative said. “We need to get it to the floor…We are going into elections and voters need to know where people stand on gun safety laws, sensible gun safety laws.”
The lawmaker’s legislation comes on the heels of Mayor Eric Adams’ “Blueprint to End Violence,” a wide-reaching plan that includes policy changes and recommendations in all parts of the criminal justice system.
Included in the plan is the reintroduction of the NYPD’s plainclothes unit, which was disbanded in 2020 amid racial justice protests. The unit, prior to its end, accounted for a disproportionate number of police killings and was the main driver behind the city’s now–unconstitutional stop and frisk practice.
In its revived form, the plainclothes unit is coming to a number of precincts throughout the city. In Queens, the unit will operate in the 114th, 101st, 103rd, 105th and 113th.
