Massachusetts has some of the strongest gun-control laws in the country, but House Speaker Robert DeLeo isn’t sure if the state would be safe from a massacre like the one committed in Orlando this week.
DeLeo is tasking a team of experts to evaluate the effectiveness of a 2014 law that put increased restrictions on gun owners and sellers.
“It’s just pretty much sort of an evaluation of the law and to decide whether—what if anything else should be done to either tighten it, to loosen it or whatever it may be,” DeLeo told WGBH News.
DeLeo says he can’t answer whether or our current laws would have prevented an Orlando-style attack.
It’s not clear if the state’s current laws would have prevented Omar Mateen, the Orlando shooter, from getting a gun license. However, the assault rifle Mateen used isn’t legal to buy in Massachusetts.
“There are a number of things that we have in our law that could possibly have effected this but for me to say definitely that would not have happened because of our strong Massachusetts law, I really couldn’t say that,” DeLeo said.
DeLeo wants the state to determine what next steps it should take to protect it’s citizens, but he says the larger question of gun violence “cries out for a federal answer.”
“We’re not doing as much as we could—especially at the federal level.” he said. “I think that’s where most of the blame should be right now.”
“I think it’s necessary for this to be a federal fix although I would say I’m not holding my breathe on this,” DeLeo said.
Recently, DeLeo joined members of the LGBTQ community in celebration after the House passed the transgender accommodations bill, and he saw many activists crying with joy. He also attended Monday evening’s vigil for the Orlando victims held in Boston.
“A little bit less than two weeks later, I’m down at City Hall Plaza and these same people are now crying. Crying tears of sorrow for the loss of someone they may have known or just about the general occurrence of what had happened and what it meant to them,” he said.
Jim Wallace, the executive director of the NRA-affiliated Gun Owners Action League, agrees that the feds need to step in to prevent mass violence, but he sees more of a threat from domestic terrorism and individuals with mental health problems, two issues he says a state can’t handle by itself.
“Until we focus on the two issues of terrorism and mental health, I think we’re going to be in trouble,” Wallace said.
DeLeo wants the expert team to deliver a thorough report in time to move legislation next year.
