During Sunday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Kasie DC,” 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) criticized Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for not taking up gun control measures in the wake of incidents of gun violence around the country.
Ryan accused McConnell of being a “sycophant” to President Donald Trump and carrying water for the National Rifle Association.
“I think it’s absolutely ridiculous, Steve, and it’s infuriating to me and so many thousands and millions of other Americans who are watching this unfold every single day, week in the United States, not just the mass shootings but also the shootings of one or two people through gun violence every single day in communities across the United States,” he said. “We’re sick of this. And we’re infuriated, and we want action. We want Mitch McConnell to get off his ass and do something in the United States Senate. How you can watch the stories of fathers getting killed with two kids, a 17-month-old kid getting damage from shrapnel, 15-year-old high school kid, and do absolutely nothing is infuriating to every American who has common sense and 90 percent with the polling who want something done. And to push this off on mental health — then why the hell is the president’s — both of his health care initiatives, one from the House and one from the Senate last year, kick 20 million people off their health care, that includes mental health coverage? So, he’s completely full of it as well.”
“And to push it off on that and then cut people’s health care shows me he’s trying to do the Potomac two-step” Ryan continued. “He’s carrying the water of the NRA. Mitch McConnell is emboldening him and as a sycophant to Donald Trump. And this stuff has got to stop, Steve. We’re tired — the American people are tired of it. And if McConnell wants to go into his election and put the Senate on the line with suburban Atlanta, suburban towns in North Carolina and Charleston and Greenville and Columbia with Lindsey Graham, and Lexington and Louisville, in Des Moines, in Topeka — look, let’s do it. Let’s do the dance. You’re going to lose. And we’re finally going to get gun reform in the United States. That’s how this is going to go down. Thirty thousand more members of Moms Demand Action just in the last couple of weeks. It’s not just the NRA standing out there all by itself. There are alternative groups of moms and parents and reasonable people — Democrats, Republicans, hunters, police officers — who are tired of it and now there’s a counterbalance, and they’re going to lose.”
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