On Sunday night, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock opened fire from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas and unleashed a shower of bullets into a crowd at a country music festival, killing 59 people. For Nelba Márquez-Greene, whose 6-year-old daughter, Ana Grace, was killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting, this incident was understandably triggering.
The mass shooting, which claimed the lives of twenty-six people-including 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut on Dec. 14, 2012, prompted President Barack Obama to press Congress to enact stricter gun control legislation, but that effort failed. The mournful mother took to Twitter on Monday to express her frustration at the U.S. government’s continued inaction, laying responsibility firmly at the feet of those in Congress who have continually failed to take preventative measures.
I don’t know what to say besides this is on every congressperson who said in ‘13: There is simply nothing we could do. #LasVegas
#Newtown— Nelba Márquez-Greene (@Nelba_MG) October 2, 2017
Márquez-Greene went on to say what we've all been thinking.
Every day, I am stunned by the level of trauma (direct or vicarious) congress is willing to make us suffer through. #Newtown
#LasVegas— Nelba Márquez-Greene (@Nelba_MG) October 2, 2017
The hypocrisy is undeniable at this point.
In America we value guns, flags & fake acts of patriotism over people, pain & real acts of courage. #LasVegas
#TakeAKnee
#EndGunViolence— Nelba Márquez-Greene (@Nelba_MG) October 2, 2017
When is enough, enough!
Did you know u have congress people who rather than talk about gun legislation implied that we hadn’t prayed hard enough?#Newtown
— Nelba Márquez-Greene (@Nelba_MG) October 2, 2017
It's a tired, pathetic, and familiar dialogue – one that President Obama directly addressed in 2015 following a mass shooting at a school in Oregon, saying, "Our thoughts and prayers are not enough…This is a political choice that we make, to allow this to happen every few months in America." Two years later, and those words still ring true.
It's time for some serious change.
