Hardest part is ahead for Murphy, Uvalde
By now, the parallels between the tragedies at Newtown, Connecticut, and Uvalde, Texas, have been well-documented. The shooters, the victims (including the shooters’ family members), the weapons used, the school settings, the news coverage, the public’s heartache — all are so similar that one might suggest that Uvalde was a copycat incident to Newtown were it not for the fact that the two massacres happened a decade apart.
Another parallel between the two is less apparent to the public but is happening right now in real time. As with Sandy Hook, there is hope for a bipartisan response to Uvalde, one that would include the same three elements that the Connecticut General Assembly addressed in its own legislative response in 2013: Mental health, school safety, and yes, gun safety.
Of course, a common denominator that bridges Newtown with Uvalde is U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy. Just weeks before being sworn in as Connecticut’s junior senator, Chris was the sitting U.S. Congressman for the Fifth District, which includes Newtown. Chris was there at the firehouse when the families were told that their loved ones would not be coming from the school to meet them. And ever since Newtown, together with Sen. Richard Blumenthal and the rest of Connecticut’s Congressional delegation, Chris has been the voice of conscience, demanding change to our country’s ambivalence toward meaningful gun safety legislation.
So it’s not surprising that Sen. Murphy is now leading that fledgling effort to reach a bipartisan agreement within the United States Senate. I, for one, am proud to see my friend and former colleague in such an important role.
But I also know that while the closeddoor discussions happening right now in Washington are a good and necessary start, the hardest job facing Chris Murphy is simply to keep the parties at the table.
In the immediate aftermath of Sandy
Hook, there was consensus from the public and politicians alike that Connecticut’s legislative response must be bipartisan. Promises were made to that effect, and indeed, the public hearings and initial negotiations maintained that bipartisan tone.
But as time passed, the commitment toward reaching common ground began to wane. Before long, my Democratic colleagues began to argue that we shouldn’t trust the Republicans to negotiate in good faith — that they would leave at the first sign of disagreement — and we should stop wasting time and run our own partisan bill instead. At the same time, the Republican leaders were feeling their own pressure to abandon the talks, in part from their rankand-file members who didn’t trust the
Democrats, as well as from their personal reality that any agreement involving gun safety would jeopardize their own political futures with their base.
In the end, what brought us to a successful result was the trust I placed in the Republican leaders, Sen. John Mckinney and Rep. Larry Cafero, and the trust John and Larry placed in me. It was an intense and difficult negotiation as we debated and discussed the technical minutiae of every aspect of the legislation. Never far from collapse, the process was often a lonely one as we knew the eyes of the nation were on us and the external pressure to abandon the bipartisan approach became more intense with each passing week. But in the end, the trust we placed in each other overcame the
pressure and produced a truly bipartisan result that became a national model, one that now serves as the basis for the current negotiations in Washington.
I do not pretend to know what pressures face Sen. Murphy and his Republican colleagues who are now at the negotiating table. What I do know is that, as time passes and negative pressures mount, it will take tremendous skill for Chris to maintain the trust that will keep them there. For the sake of our children and our country, we should all wish him Godspeed.