Florida newspaper demands stricter gun control laws following Uvalde massacre: 'When will it end?'

In 2022, the United States has been plagued by a variety of gun violence, from shootings on the New York City subway to a White nationalist terrorist attack in Buffalo on May 14 to a horrific massacre at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas on Tuesday, May 24 that left at least 19 children and two teachers dead. The Uvalde attack was hardly the first time a school became the target of a mass shooting in the U.S., and a passionate editorial published by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel on May 25 warns that more school shootings will occur unless the U.S. adopts stricter gun laws.

“Littleton, Colorado. Newtown, Connecticut. Parkland, Florida. Uvalde, Texas,” the Sun-Sentinel’s editorial board writes. “In eight mass school shootings since 1999, 111 children and young adults and 13 faculty and staff members have now been sacrificed on the profane altar of the gun industry’s profits.”

The Sun-Sentinel’s editorial board continues, “Fourteen children and three adults at our Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School were among them. Four years later, Broward County still feels the shock and sorrow and the frustration of seeing nothing done where it must be — in Congress. The nation needs a ban on the sale of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines and a buyback program like New Zealand’s, enacted after only one mass slaughter.”

Some far-right MAGA Republicans will accuse the Sun-Sentinel’s editorial board of being anti-2nd Amendment, which it isn’t. The Sun-Sentinel’s editorial board does, however, call for common-sense measures and stresses that there is no reason why someone like the shooter in Uvalde should have easy access to semiautomatic weapons.

“There must be nationwide mandatory background checks with no loophole for gun shows or private sales,” the Sun-Sentinel’s editorial board recommends. “Possession of an untraceable ‘ghost weapon’ must become a crime. All states must be encouraged to enact and enforce ‘red flag’ laws and to ban the purchase of any weapon by anyone under age 21, as Florida did after Parkland in 2018. Otherwise, there will be more shock, sorrow, frustration and anger. When will it end?”