Florida Democrats had little trouble rounding up enough members to call for a vote on whether to hold a special session dealing with gun control as a reaction to last month’s mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando.
However, it may be nearly impossible over the next week to gather enough Republican lawmakers willing to make the trek to humid Tallahassee in an election year to discuss a proposed prohibition on gun sales to people on federal terrorism watch lists.
Democratic lawmakers submitted 46 letters Tuesday from House and Senate members — more than the 32 required — to demand Secretary of State Ken Detzner poll all 160 legislators in the next week on the special session request.
“The key is we’ve requested at the very least (that) we review reforms we all support, such as banning people ... who are on the terrorist FBI watch list” from buying guns, said state Sen. Darren Soto, an Orlando Democrat who is running for a Central Florida congressional seat.
Soto and state Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Coral Springs, led a news conference Tuesday outside the Orange County Courthouse in Orlando to repeat the call for the extra session.
“Right now in Florida,” Soto continued, “there’s nothing stopping individuals on these lists from purchasing firearms and letting this happen again.”
The push for the special session comes in the wake of the June 12 shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub, during which a gunman killed 49 people and wounded 50 others before he was killed by police.
The attack is the worst mass shooting in the nation’s history.
Rep. Janet Cruz of Tampa, set to lead House Democrats after the November elections, said the legislation can’t wait until the next regular session in March.
“The welfare of our people is at stake,” Cruz said.
Support to call the session is required from three-fifths of the members of each chamber of the Legislature, something that will be extremely difficult with the current Republican majorities.
House Speaker Steve Crisafulli issued a statement Tuesday encouraging each member to “follow their conscience,” while quickly saying he won’t vote for a session “motivated by partisan politics.”
“I know I speak for representatives of both parties when I say that if there was a meaningful, constitutional, and implementable state law to prevent future terrorist attacks, we would certainly pass it,” said Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island.
“I strongly support a ban on terrorists’ ability to purchase firearms. Since the list is maintained at the federal level, the state cannot pass an effective or constitutional law implementing such a ban,” he said.
Senate President Andy Gardiner, R-Orlando, added he wouldn’t vote to turn “the Senate floor into a campaign stop for those seeking higher office.”
“I, too, am frustrated with the partisan bickering that so often paralyzes Washington, but the fact remains that a special session of the Florida Legislature cannot take the place of leadership in Washington,” he said.
In a column appearing Monday in the Northwest Daily News, Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, wrote that a special session was “peddled off the back of campaign bandwagons.”
“Huddling up a bunch of breathless legislators in Tallahassee to snap-pass laws banning guns won’t stop some terrorism-inspired human tool from building a bomb out of fertilizer or shopping the robust weapons black markets that inevitably exist in places where law-abiding citizens are disarmed,” wrote Gaetz, a former Senate president who is leaving office this year because of term limits.
Influential National Rifle Association lobbyist Marion Hammer said Tuesday that Democrats are “exploiting a tragedy for political gain” and may not want to actually hold the special session.
“I have not heard a single Republican say that they were interested in spending the taxpayer’s money for a special session that would achieve nothing but more publicity for Democrats,” Hammer said.
Asked if she has advised lawmakers not to vote for the session, Hammer replied: “No, we don’t do that.”