Patrick Neville has experience a school shooting. In fact, he survived one of the most harrowing in this nation’s history: Columbine. Now, he’s a representative in Colorado’s legislature, where he has just introduced a bill that would allow concealed carry firearms in schools (via Newsweek):
A survivor of the Columbine school shooting has introduced a bill that would allow people with a concealed carry permit to bring guns into K-12 schools.
Patrick Neville, who attended Columbine High School in 1999 when Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris carried out a massacre that left 15 people including the shooters dead, introduced the bill in his role as Colorado house minority leader.
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The bill summary states that “with certain exceptions, current law limits the authority of a person who holds a valid permit to carry a concealed handgun by prohibiting a permit holder from carrying a concealed handgun on public elementary, middle, junior high, or high school grounds. The bill removes this limitation.”
This bill or any that permits more armed guards at school is not controversial, or at least it shouldn’t be. Newtown’s school board voted in favor of armed guards after the tragic Sandy Hook shooting. This is also an initiative endorsed by the National Rifle Association.
President Trump held a roundtable-like meeting with victims of school shootings to get their perspective and gauge what they think could be done to prevent such horrific events from happening again. It was a grounded discussion. Yes, there were some who wanted to ban so-called assault weapons, limit magazine sizes, and said we need to look into what Australia did to reduce gun violence, the latter of which is unconstitutional since the land down under confiscated firearms. Others were very supportive of having armed guards on campus and making sure schools are more secure regarding access points.
There is an emotional call for government to do something—and anti-gunners have to realize that it will probably not come in the form of banning so-called assault weapons and limiting magazine sizes. On background checks, maybe there could be something that could be done concerning reporting mental health and past criminal convictions better. At the same time, it’s a bit disconcerting that the FBI totally dropped the ball on the tip on the Florida shooter. The bureau received a tip on January 5 and did nothing about it. These are the people who conduct the federally mandated background check on gun transfers made at FFL dealers (i.e. guns stores). Maybe it’s not that we need any significant new gun laws. It could be grounded in better detection of troubling behavior, proper reporting of erratic behavior for NICS, and having competent staffers running the NICS check.
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