In an interview with Reuters, Republican Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) said he believes there is a path to 60 votes in the Republican-controlled Senate to pass a bipartisan background checks bill, similar to the 2013 legislation he introduced with Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) following the Sandy Hook mass shooting.
“Republican U.S. Senator Pat Toomey said a Democratic House could put pressure on the Senate to reconsider a bipartisan background checks measure he sponsored after the 2012 school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 first-graders. The bill narrowly failed to get the 60 votes needed for passage.
Now, he said, “there is a distinct possibility that we could have enough Republicans to get to 60, but that’s still an open question.”
Tomorrow, Wednesday, one day before the one-year mark since the Parkland mass shooting, the House Judiciary Committee will mark up H.R. 8, the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019, which would require background checks on all gun sales. The bipartisan legislation was introduced with five Republican and five Democratic cosponsors.