Feinstein: ‘Shame on us’

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) on Sunday predicted that there will be more “devastating attacks” like the one near the University of California, Santa Barbara if universal background checks are not passed.

“We must ask ourselves if an individual whose family called police with concerns about mental health, who is receiving therapy and who has had several run-ins with police should be allowed to own multiple firearms and hundreds of rounds of ammunition,” the California Democrat said in a statement.

{mosads}Authorities say Elliot Rodger, 22, killed six people on Friday evening in the town of Isla Vista, Calif., during a stabbing and shooting rampage. Thirteen other people were injured before Rodger took his own life.

Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown told CNN on Sunday morning that Rodger purchased the weapons from licensed firearms dealers in Goleta, Oxnard and Burbank over the course of the year.

Deputies who interacted three times with Rodger didn’t feel he was a danger to himself of other people, Brown said, adding that Rodger was timid and quiet shy in those interactions, which included a “welfare check” requested by the county’s mental health department.

“When anyone, no matter their mental health or history, can so easily obtain any gun they want and as many as they want – we must recognize a problem, Feinstein said.

“Unfortunately, the NRA continues to have a stranglehold on Congress, preventing even commonsense measures like universal background checks that have overwhelming support,” she added. “Until that happens, we will continue to see these devastating attacks. Shame on us for allowing this to continue.”

Democrats attempted to push for new gun control measures after an elementary school shooting in Connecticut in December of 2012, but the measure died in the spring of 2013 after it was unable to clear a 60-vote hurdle in the Senate.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Calif.) Blumenthal said during an appearance on CBS’s “Face The Nation” on Sunday that the most recent shooting showed the legislation should be revived.

“I really since hope that this…unimaginable, unspeakable tragedy will provide an impetus to bring back measures that would keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people who are severely troubled or deranged like this young man was,” he said.