De Luca Plans D.C. Gun Control Advocacy Trip

Maplewood Mayor Vic De Luca will join 60 other mayors from across the country Wednesday in Washington, D.C., to advocate for stronger gun-control laws in light of last month’s school shooting in Newtown, Conn., his office announced Tuesday.

De Luca is a member of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a national bipartisan coalition of more than 800 mayors with nearly a million grassroots supporters.

“We will bring a message from the grassroots, from the moms and dads and sisters and brothers across America, that federal action is needed now to stem the tide of gun violence,” De Luca said in a news release. “New Jersey’s Congressional delegation needs to be on board with this effort.”

In the wake of the Dec. 14, 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School that left 26 people dead, Mayors Against Illegal Gun sent a letter to the White House and all members of Congress with three proposals to prevent gun violence in the United States, including: 

• Requiring background checks for all U.S. gun sales, including the millions of “private” sales conducted over the internet, at guns shows and in other locales. 

• Enacting common-sense restrictions on the purchase and transfer of military style weapons and high capacity magazines. 

• Making gun trafficking a federal crime and establishing enhanced penalties for kingpin gun traffickers. 

One key bill, the Fix Gun Checks Act (HR 137), has already been re-introduced in Congress, and several more are scheduled to be introduced in the coming weeks. 

De Luca will ask members of the state’s delegation to become original sponsors of HR 137 (or the Senate companion), which requires background checks for all sales and also improves the reporting of relevant mental health records into the nation’s gun background check database.