Senators ‘closer than ever’ in talks to enact gun measures

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of U.S. senators continues to move forward on negotiating limited measures to help prevent mass shootings, though a deal is far from assured, senators involved in the talks from both parties said on Sunday.

“There are intensive discussions underway,” Sen. Pat Toomey, Republican of Pennsylvania, said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “It includes people who have not been engaged on this issue in the past. I certainly can’t guarantee any outcome, but it feels to me like we are closer than we’ve been since I’ve been in the Senate.”

Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who along with Texas Republican John Cornyn is leading the bipartisan talks, also said the group is “closer than ever before” to a package of gun measures that can meet the 60-vote threshold needed to overcome a filibuster in the Senate.

“As late as last night, we were engaged in conversations,” Murphy said on CNN’S “State of the Union,” though he remains “anxious about failure.”

House Democrats have proposed a package of gun legislation that would raise the minimum age to purchase some semiautomatic rifles to 21 from 18. There have also been calls for a federal “red flag” law that would allow courts to temporarily take away guns from people because of mental health concerns.

Murphy said one focus of the Senate talks is negotiating measures to identify people in the 18- to 21-year-old age range that could present a danger and prevent them from acquiring guns.

Senators in the group are examining how “to make sure that we aren’t giving a weapon to anybody that has during their younger years a mental health history, a juvenile record. Often those juvenile records aren’t accessible when they walk into the gun store buying as an adult,” Murphy said.

President Joe Biden last week addressed the nation and urged Congress to pass some gun limits after 19 children and two teachers were killed in a mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, and a racist attack at a grocery store in Buffalo, New York, left 10 victims dead.

WALLY SKALIJ / LOS ANGELES TIMES Family members place a picture at a memorial outside school in Uvalde, Texas, where 19 students and two teachers were shot and killed.