Moms Demand Action Volunteers Attended President’s Philadelphia Announcement Today
WASHINGTON — Everytown for Gun Safety and its grassroots networks, Moms Demand Action and Students Demand Action, released the following statements today applauding President Joe Biden’s Fiscal Year 2024 budget for including critical gun violence prevention funding. Moms Demand Action volunteers were in attendance at today’s event to support the President’s budget proposal.
“President Biden is leading the strongest gun safety administration in history, and his budget is charting the course to a future where Americans can live free from the fear of gun violence,” said John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety. “Now it’s time for Congress to pick up the baton by funding community violence intervention programs and ensuring federal law enforcement agencies have the resources they need to combat gun crime.”
“After breaking a nearly 30-year logjam of federal inaction on gun safety, our grassroots army stands firmly behind President Biden and joins his call to make sure gun violence prevention is fully funded,” said Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action. “President Biden has fought for gun safety and Moms Demand Action and Students Demand Action volunteers are proud to continue supporting his ongoing gun violence prevention efforts.”
The President’s budget proposal includes several gun safety priorities:
- $19.4 billion over 10 years for crime prevention strategies and affirms President Biden’s goal to provide $5 billion over 10 years for community violence intervention programs
- $1.9 billion for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and explosives to expand multijurisdictional gun trafficking strike forces with additional personnel, increase regulation of the firearms industry, and implement the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act
- $51 million for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to support the continued implementation of enhanced background checks required by the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act
- $1 billion to support implementation of programs through the Violence Against Women Act of 1994 (VAWA), which was recently reauthorized and strengthened in 2022—a $300 million or 43-percent increase over the 2023 enacted level, the highest funding level in history
- Historic investments in the behavioral health workforce, youth mental health treatment, Certified Community Based Behavioral Health Clinics, Community Mental Health Centers, and mental health research
- Strengthened access to crisis services by investing in the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline to address 100 percent of estimated contacts, scaling follow-up crisis services, and expanding CDC’s suicide prevention program to all States, the District of Columbia, and 18 tribal and territorial jurisdictions
Everytown, Moms Demand Action and Students Demand Action continue to work with the gun safety majority in the Senate, gun sense champions in the House, and the Biden-Harris Administration to ensure robust implementation and strong enforcement of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act and our gun laws as a whole.
