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Abdussabur calls for national strategy at DNC Thursday.
Philadelphia — If a New Haven cop, a Connecticut governor, and like-minded Democrats gathered here Thursday have their way, it will no longer be so easy for practically anyone to get a gun in America.
“You can buy a gun on your phone,” New haven police Sgt. Shafiq Abdussabur, a former president of the National Association of Black Law Enforcement Officers, told the gathering. “If you have an iPhone and your information is saved you can buy a gun on your phone. That’s ridiculous.”
The gathering, hosted by the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, took place at the Pennsylvania Convention Center as part of the Democratic National Convention.
Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and New Haven police Sgt. Shafiq Abdussabur joined Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, U.S. Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, Zeke Stokes, vice president for GLAAD, and the Rev. Betty Deas Clark, former pastor of Mother Emanuel AME Church to reinforce a central plank of the Democratic Party platform: a call for increased gun control.
Whether it was the shooting of elementary school children in Sandy Hook, or young black men dying on city streets, the common denominator is a gun that is all too easy to obtain in America, speakers said.
They said they’re counting on the presidency of Hillary Clinton to help them finally curb America’s love affair with that weapon.
Malloy, who served as the co-chair of the Democratic platform committee, talked about what it was like to inform the families of Sandy Hook Elementary School at the scene of the massacre there that if they had not already been reunited with their loved ones —there would be no reunion.
Malloy on shootings: Your town is next.
In the wake of Sandy Hook, Connecticut has passed gun control laws requiring background checks and holding gun holders accountable if their gun is used to injure or kill someone. But Malloy said more needs to be done nationwide to stem the easy ability to get a gun particularly automatic weapons that have the capacity to shoot multiple rounds.
He also blamed Republicans for fighting against gun reform laws and passing legislation with loopholes that makes it easy for anyone who wants a gun — a person with a mental illness, criminal or terrorist — to get one.
Lewis fires up the crowd.
“What we need to do, is what the Congressman said, what John Lewis would do, what the mayor [of Los Angeles] would do; Don’t stop,” he said echoing the words of U.S. Rep. John Lewis, who opened the event talking about how guns played a role in killing some of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and John F. and Bobby Kennedy. Lewis recently led a sit-in in the House over failure to raise a gun-control measure for a vote.
“Stand up, sit down, whatever you’re doing don’t stop, because it’s coming to your neighborhood. Why is it coming to your neighborhood? Because we sell weapons of mass destruction,” Malloy said.
Brady Campaign President Dan Gross said advocates are pushing for a crackdown on “bad apple” gun dealers: the 5 percent of gun dealers who supply 90 percent of all the unauthorized guns police get off the streets.
Clyburn urged anti-gun advocates to be as vocal as gun rights advocates.
Clyburn said the Supreme Court has upheld the right of local governments to require permits for people who want to exercise that amendment’s provision for assembly.
“You can’t yell fire in a crowded room,” he said in urging activists to not remain silence on gun violence. “Why is the Second Amendment absolute? We cannot allow people to get way with this.”