This weekend saw a series of tragic shootings across the country — many of which were deadly. Early Saturday morning in Kentucky, seven people were shot and wounded outside of the Lexington Legends baseball stadium — just one of at least three shootings that took place across the city that night. On Sunday in Texas, three people were shot and killed and two others were wounded while fleeing a building fire in Houston. Across the state in Fort Worth, three children were shot outside a home that same day, two fatally.
Sunday evening saw even more tragedy. In Bend, Oregon, a shooter armed with an AR-15 opened fire in a shopping center, killing two people and wounding at least one other. In Arizona, two people were killed and five injured, including two police officers, when a shooter armed with a semi-automatic rifle and tactical gear opened fire at random in Phoenix, and in D.C., Commanders running back Brian Robinson, Jr. was shot multiple times in an attempted armed robbery, according to reports.
The impact of these shootings reverberates far beyond those who are killed or wounded. Each one leaves visible and invisible scars on survivors, families, and entire communities. And tragically, these shootings only scratch the surface of the gun violence that impacts communities across the country every single day. In an average year, 40,620 people are killed by guns across the country, and 76,374 more are wounded — a crisis that has grown even more deadly over time.
Research shows that states with weak gun laws have higher rates of gun violence. To put an end to our country’s gun violence crisis, lawmakers at every level must prioritize common sense gun safety measures that will save lives. Earlier this year, lawmakers passed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, the first federal gun safety legislation to become law in almost 30 years. As communities across the country continue to be impacted by acts of gun violence, state and local lawmakers must take a cue from federal lawmakers and work across the aisle to pass common sense gun safety laws.
More information about gun violence in the United States is available here, and Everytown’s interactive gun law platform — which shows the direct correlation between the strength of a state’s gun laws and its rate of gun deaths — is available here.
