US House of Representatives. (Credits: Google)
- The bill would raise the minimum age to purchase a semi-automatic weapon from 18 to 21 years old.
- It is unlikely to be accepted by the Senate, which is evenly divided.
- The move comes as the US is still grieving from last month’s deadly shooting at an elementary school.
The US House of Representatives enacted a gun-control bill on Wednesday that is unlikely to be accepted by the Senate, which is evenly divided.
The bill, entitled the Protecting Our Kids Act, was enacted by a vote of 223-204, mostly along party lines.
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The bill would, among other things, raise the minimum age to purchase a semi-automatic weapon from 18 to 21 years old and prohibit people from using bump stocks.
Senators from both parties have met to discuss gun legislation in the hopes of reaching an agreement on stricter gun laws.
The move on Capitol Hill comes as the US is still grieving from last month’s deadly shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, which killed 19 children and two teachers.
Miah Cerrillo, a fourth-grader at Robb Elementary School who survived the massacre, told Congress on Wednesday that she coated herself in her friend’s blood and pretended to be dead.
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In a taped video to a House panel, Cerrillo, 11, said of the gunman, “He shot my friend that was next to me, and I thought he was going to come back to the room,” “So I grabbed the blood, and I put it all over me.”
She also stated that she sought “security” when she went to school, despite the fact that she no longer feels protected.