Pelosi: Senate should vote again on gun control legislation

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday said the Senate should vote again on legislation to expand background checks to keep firearms out of the hands of felons and the mentally ill. 

{mosads}Pelosi pledged that she will not give up on gun control, an issue she said affects the lives of everyone. 

“I’d like the Senate to take another shot so that we can win on it. I don’t know what changes they can make,” she said.

She noted that polls show 90 percent of the public supported expanding background checks after last year’s mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

“What more, 90 percent of the American people support background checks. How come that’s not reflected in some way for this discrete bill to pass the Senate and the House? We’re not giving up on this. We’re not going away on it,” she said.

She said Congress owes it to the families of the victims of Sandy Hook and the 12 people killed at the Washington Navy Yard on Monday to act.

Pelosi believes legislation to expand background checks on gun purchasers, which fell five votes short in the Senate, would pass the House.

“We believe that if the Senate bill that did not prevail for the lack of 60 votes would come up in the House that it would pass, that it would pass in the House of Representatives,” she said.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said this week he does not have enough votes to pass gun control legislation and does not plan to move any bill soon.

Pelosi does not want to see another loss in the Senate, but she doesn’t want Democrats to give up on the issue either.

“What I would like to see is for us to pass legislation, not not to pass legislation,” she said.

She said Congress could “restore confidence in the safety of our neighborhoods, our schools, our communities by passing the background check legislation.”