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      in US Politics

      Biden ‘confident’ of reaching deal with McCarthy to avoid US debt default

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      Joe Biden and the Republican speaker of the US House, Kevin McCarthy, said on Wednesday they thought a deal to avoid a US debt default was in reach.Speaking at the White House, Biden said: “I’m confident that we’ll get the agreement on the budget, that America will not default.“We’re going to come together because there’s no alternative way to do the right thing for the country. We have to move on.”On Tuesday, Biden and McCarthy met for an hour at the White House, a meeting the president called productive.Biden, who has faced some criticism for his handling of the issue, is due to travel to the G7 summit in Japan but has cut the trip short to pursue a debt ceiling deal. Plans to visit Papua New Guinea and Australia were postponed.On Wednesday, the president said: “I’ll be in constant contact with my team while I’m at the G7 and be in close touch with speaker McCarthy and other leaders as well.“What I have done in anticipation that we won’t get it all done till I get back is, I’ve cut my trip short in order to be [here] for the final negotiations and sign the deal with the majority leader.”Biden said he expected to return to Washington on Sunday and hold a press conference. Biden’s press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, told CNN that Biden’s decision to cut short his Asia trip sent “the message that … America does not default on its debt”.Also on Wednesday, McCarthy spoke to CNBC.He said: “I think at the end of the day we do not have a debt default. The thing I’m confident about is now we have a structure to find a way to come to a conclusion. The timeline is very tight. But we’re going to make sure we’re in the room and get this done.”A failure to honour US debts could have catastrophic impacts on the US and world economies. The US treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, has indicated that without agreement, default could come as early as 1 June.Republicans want sharp spending cuts. Democrats say Republicans should agree to a “clean” debt bill, the sort they repeatedly passed under Donald Trump. But Biden also seemed ready to make some compromises, including some work requirements on federal programs, though not on healthcare programs.Financial markets appeared to be buoyed as McCarthy joined the Republican Senate leader, Mitch McConnell, and the White House in pledging the US would not fail to pay its debt obligations. US stock indexes opened higher on Wednesday.Biden was widely reported to have agreed to a key demand from McCarthy: that negotiations be carried out by a small group of aides, removing, for now, Democratic leaders in the House and Senate.Politico said Biden was now represented by the White House counselor Steve Richetti, budget director Shalanda Young and legislative affairs director Louisa Terrell. Garret Graves, a Louisiana Republican and McCarthy ally, was leading the Republican team.McCarthy, who controls the House by just five seats, is widely seen to be at the mercy of the far right of the Republican caucus. But according to Politico, Graves “isn’t a bomb-thrower or grandstander, and Democrats told us they’ve seen him as a steady hand in other bipartisan policy negotiations”.Politico reported that the new negotiators “huddled on Capitol Hill last night to start negotiations, reflecting the time crunch as the clock ticks toward a possible 1 June default”. Punchbowl News said “full-scale negotiations [were] set to kick off” on Wednesday.It will not be a simple process. The negotiators, Punchbowl said, had “a very difficult task ahead of them. They need to find a deal that can pass Congress in the next 15 days. To do that, they’ll have to come up with a framework over the next few days.“This is a massive lift that will require deft negotiating, cooperation from all sides and incredible flexibility on behalf of our national political leadership. Basically everything that Congress hasn’t done at all this year and traditionally isn’t very good at.”House Republicans are demanding $4.8tn in spending cuts, mostly to Democratic priorities including welfare and environment spending. Demonstrating the political vice in which Biden finds himself, progressives have warned him not to give in.“It’s really important we don’t give ground,” Pramila Jayapal, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told Axios. “We have made it clear … that if they give on these core Democratic values, there will be a huge backlash.”Jean-Pierre told CNN that Republicans “want to cut healthcare, they want to increase poverty, and it’s not going to save much money”.Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic House minority leader, also spoke to CNBC.“It creates uncertainty that’s bad for the American people. It’s bad for the economy. That’s bad for business,” he said. “And so our view has consistently been that any resolution of this matter has to be at least two years in nature. And that was a position that was once again made clear in the meeting yesterday.”Punchbowl said: “If Democrats want to hike the debt limit until 2025, McCarthy is going to demand a lot in return.”Jeffries insisted: “Our view is that if we’re going to have a thoughtful conversation about deficit reduction, that conversation can’t simply be one-sided, based on the rightwing ideological perspective of a handful of extreme Maga Republicans.“That’s not how you make public policy.” More

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      in US Politics

      The fall of Rudy Giuliani, once the toast of New York, continues unabated | Lloyd Green

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      From “America’s mayor” to a human punchline, Rudy Giuliani’s descent continues unabated. On Monday, news broke of the septuagenarian Giuliani being slammed with a $10m sexual harassment and unpaid wages lawsuit brought by Noelle Dunphy, 43, a former aide. The mighty have fallen.Once he was the toast of town. As a federal prosecutor he sent a congressman to jail, locked up mobsters and indicted white-collar criminals. As mayor, he made the streets again feel safe. Love him or hate him, crime precipitously dropped on his watch.In the days and months following 9/11, he projected strength, confidence and reassurance. He had braced himself for a calamity; he just didn’t know its source or when it would happen. He was steady when crunchtime arrived.As mayor, his tenure was consequential. His eight years at city hall rank up there with Fiorello La Guardia, Michael Bloomberg and Ed Koch. All that feels like aeons ago.These days, Giuliani and the words “defendant” and “buffoon” stand adjacent. He remains under criminal investigation by a Georgia prosecutor. Beyond that, he is a defendant in at least three separate pending election-related defamation lawsuits.His life is tumultuous. He is plagued by an image problem. His appearance in Borat 2 will forever haunt him.Watching him shove his hands down his pants was pathetic and pitiable. His awkwardness and desperation remain indelible.But it doesn’t end there. In the aftermath of Donald Trump’s defeat at the hands of Joe Biden, hair dye running down Rudy’s face became another unforgettable scene in American political lore.It presaged what followed. In that moment, you knew that Rudy had gone off the rails, worse that he possessed no limits when it came to Trump.Yet Giuliani’s latest woes cannot be described as wholly surprising. He always possessed a penchant for drama and a tropism for the transgressive. He loved the opera and his life emerged as operatic. As a prosecutor, he dressed up “undercover”. Then as mayor, he performed onstage in drag with Trump.All that came with a darker side. The warning signs were there. We just chose to ignore them.Amid his first campaign for mayor, in 1989, a story broke of a concentration camp survivor, Simon Berger, being held in federal custody, facing a blackboard that read “Arbeit Macht Frei”, the slogan written across the gates of Auschwitz. Berger would be acquitted. Decades later, Dunphy alleged that Giuliani has a problem with Jews.Fast forward to May 2000. Giuliani publicly announced that he was leaving Donna Hanover, his second wife. No one was more shocked than Hanover. Rudy had shredded the boundary between public and private.A year later, Rudy attempted to stretch out his term as mayor beyond its legal limits. Then again, his mother was a fan of Mussolini and his father spent time for armed robbery at Sing Sing, a prison located in upstate New York.Rudy also sought to make Bernie Kerik, his police commissioner, head of US homeland security. That went badly. Kerik eventually wound up in prison and George W Bush was left to do clean-up on aisle seven.During the 2016-17 presidential transition, rumours swirled of Giuliani coveting an appointment as secretary of state. That moment never arrived.There were “whispers from the staff ‘about his health and stability’,” Michael Wolff wrote in Fire and Fury, his 2018 blockbuster.To be sure, they were the same whispers echoed at a pre-inaugural lunch held at a Manhattan steakhouse by veterans of Giuliani’s time at city hall, and those with significant ties to the Trump administration.For the record, Dunphy’s pleadings are replete with references to Giuliani and alcohol.Giuliani and Ukraine made headlines, too. He and his buddies played Inspector Clouseau. In the end, Giuliani avoided prosecution, but Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas were convicted on federal charges.The political dexterity and judgment that Giuliani once demonstrated has vanished. He is conscious of the decline. “I don’t care about my legacy,” he adds. “I’ll be dead.”Nearly three years after the 2020 election, Trump refuses to concede and remains the frontrunner for the Republican nomination. “Giuliani, on the other hand, [is] finished in every conceivable way,” wrote Giuliani biographer Andrew Kirtzman.Along the way, Rudy’s future grows bleaker and more mirthless. More

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      in US Politics

      Trump wins proxy battle with DeSantis over pick for Kentucky governor

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      Donald Trump scored a proxy victory over Ron DeSantis on Tuesday, the Republican presidential frontrunner’s preferred candidate beating the choice of the Florida governor, Trump’s closest rival, in a gubernatorial primary in Kentucky.Daniel Cameron, the first major-party Black nominee for governor in Kentucky history, will face the Democratic incumbent, Andy Beshear, in November.Cameron, the state attorney general, claimed a convincing victory over a 12-candidate field including Kelly Craft, who was United Nations ambassador in the Trump administration and who won a late endorsement from DeSantis.Beshear easily beat two challengers in his own primary.Cameron is the first Black Kentucky attorney general and would be its first Black governor. He played up the historic nature of his nomination in his victory speech, saying he would “embody the promise of America, that if you work hard and if you stand on principle, anything is possible”.“To anyone who looks like me, know that you can achieve anything,” Cameron said. “Know that in this country and in Kentucky, all that matters are your values.”Kentucky will be one of the most closely watched states in November, analysts seeking clues for the 2024 presidential race. Beshear is a popular governor but he will face a tough re-election bid in a Republican-dominated state after a first term marked by the Covid pandemic, natural disasters and a mass shooting that killed one of his closest friends.Beshear touted his stewardship of Kentucky’s economy and blasted the tone of the Republican primary.“Right now somewhere in America, there is a CEO deciding where to move their business and they’re considering Kentucky,” Beshear told supporters on Tuesday. “Let me ask you: is seeing people talk down our state and our economy, insult our people and stoke divisions going to help that next company choose Kentucky? Of course not.”In 2019, Beshear used the attorney general’s office as a springboard to the governorship. As attorney general, he challenged executive actions by the then Republican governor, Matt Bevin, who he then beat narrowly.If Beshear follows his campaign formula from 2019, he will avoid talking about Trump or dwelling on polarizing national issues. He is also expected to draw on his family’s strong political brand – his father, Steve Beshear, is a former two-term Kentucky governor.Cameron succeeded Beshear as attorney general and mounted numerous challenges against state and national Democratic policies, essentially halting Covid-era restrictions. Beshear says his actions saved lives and that he leaned on guidance from Trump’s Covid taskforce.A former aide to the Republican US Senate leader, Mitch McConnell, Cameron is one of the most prominent Black Republicans. His victory will play into Trump’s efforts to solidify his lead in the presidential primary.Rivalry between Cameron and Craft dominated the Kentucky primary. Cameron endured an advertising blitz by Craft’s campaign and an outside group that portrayed Cameron as an “establishment teddy bear”. A pro-Cameron group returned fire.Cameron’s handling of an investigation into the fatal shooting of Breonna Taylor by Louisville police in 2020, which contributed to nationwide protests for policing reform, could now come under renewed scrutiny.Announcing a grand jury’s findings, Cameron said jurors “agreed” homicide charges were not warranted because officers were fired upon. Three jurors said Cameron’s staff did not give them an opportunity to consider homicide charges.Cameron must also build party unity. He has previously bridged the rift between Trump and McConnell. Previously the senator’s legal counsel, he made a high-profile pitch for Trump at the Republican convention in 2020. More

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      in US Politics

      George Santos: Democrats move to expel indicted Republican from Congress

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      Democrats moved on Tuesday to expel George Santos from Congress.The New York Republican won election in November last year but his résumé has been shown to be largely made up and his campaign finances and past behaviour, some allegedly criminal, have been scrutinised in tremendous detail.Last week, federal prosecutors indicted Santos on multiple counts of wire fraud, money laundering, theft of public funds and lying to Congress. Appearing in court on Long Island, he pleaded not guilty and claimed to be the victim of a political witch hunt.Now, House Democrats have triggered a political manoeuvre designed to force Republicans to either break with Santos or publicly vote to defend him.To succeed, a privileged resolution introduced by Robert Garcia, a California Democrat, must attract two-thirds support in the House. The resolution could come to a vote within two days.On Tuesday, Garcia told reporters: “The Republicans in the House are actually going to have to go on record and make a decision about if they’re actually going to stand for truth and accountability, or if they’re going to stand with someone that’s clearly a liar.”Some Republicans have said Santos should quit but as yet party leaders have not broken with him, saying he has a right to seek acquittal while representing his district.Republicans control the House by just five seats – and Democrats would be favoured to win Santos’s seat should it fall vacant. In January, amid a far-right rebellion, Santos supported Kevin McCarthy through 15 votes for speaker.Garcia also said Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the Democratic minority leader, was “involved” in the process.McCarthy told reporters he would talk to Jeffries about referring the resolution to the House ethics committee, which he hoped would “move rapidly” despite rarely doing so or imposing heavy punishments.Only five members of the House have ever been expelled. Three were kicked out for fighting for the Confederacy in the civil war. Two were expelled after being convicted of crimes.The last, James Traficant of Ohio, was expelled in 2002. Like Santos, Traficant cut a somewhat picaresque path through the halls of power.Reporting his death in 2014, the New York Times said Traficant was known for his “colorful personality and wardrobe, his legislative theatrics and his wild mop of hair.“So it was something of a surprise when the hair turned out to be fake, a fact that was made clear when he had to remove his toupée during booking after his arrest on bribery and racketeering charges.”Traficant did not let his expulsion stop him running for re-election, as an independent and from federal custody in Pennsylvania. Though unsuccessful, he received more than 28,000 votes.Santos has announced a run for re-election. McCarthy has said he does not support such a move.On Tuesday, Garcia told MSNBC McCarthy had “lost all control of his caucus. He needs Santos for key votes on the on the deficit, on the budget, and so … he’s been working with literally a liar and a huge fraudster in the Congress.“So now McCarthy’s going to actually have to make a choice, if he will support George Santos … or if he’s actually going to listen to the American people.“And so we’re gonna continue to push this as best possible. We think it’s absolutely the right approach. And we’ve given plenty of time to George Santos to resign. We’ve been calling for his resignation for months and for months. It’s time for him to do the right thing.” More

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      in Elections

      Biden speaks of ‘devastating’ effect of debt limit failure as he cuts short Asia tour – video

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      The US president has decided to cancel an upcoming visit to Australia and Papua New Guinea to focus on the debt limit standoff at home. Joe Biden had been due to address the Australian parliament and was also expected to meet with other leaders of the Quad. The US president said failure on debt negotiations would spark a recession and quoted Moody’s as saying 8 million Americans would lose their jobs More

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      in US Politics

      New Mexico shooter roamed area with at least three guns, police say

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      An 18-year-old man who stalked a New Mexico neighborhood, fatally shooting three people “at random” on Monday, armed himself with at least three guns, one of which was the style of powerful rifle used during many mass shootings, officials said, renewing calls for legislation to combat gun violence.The attack, which also left six people injured, came as the US is poised to see its worst year in recent history for mass killings.Police named the three dead victims as 97-year-old Gwendolyn Schofield, her 73-year-old daughter, Melody Ivie, and 79-year-old Shirley Voita.The deadly shooting erupted about 11am local time in Farmington, a city of about 50,000. “The suspect roamed throughout the neighborhood, up to a quarter of a mile,” Farmington’s police chief, Steve Hebbe, said.Authorities also named the shooter as local 18-year-old high school student Beau Wilson, but added they were still trying to determine a motive for the attack. Wilson lived in the Farmington neighborhood where he opened fire.Farmington deputy police chief Kyle Dowdy said there is nothing yet leading investigators to believe Wilson knew any of the people he shot. “We’re pretty confident in that is was completely random,” he said.Wilson legally purchased at least one of the guns he used in November.The gunman, who was confronted by police and killed, shot at least six houses and three cars during the attack. Authorities said that the gunman did not target any particular location – such as a school or church – nor people during the shooting.Some of the shootings were captured on video that was uploaded to TikTok, which police confirmed was authentic.The footage shows a man clad in black clothes pacing near a driveway outside the First Church of Christ, Scientist, with an apparent handgun. Later, the footage shows him being shot by police.Neighborhood resident Joseph Robledo, 32, hurried home after hearing that his wife and one-year-old daughter hid in their laundry room during the gunfire. A bullet went through his baby’s room and its window, but did not strike anyone.An older woman was in the street in front of his house. She had been shot while driving by and appeared to have fallen out of her vehicle, which kept going without her, Robles said.“I went out to see because the lady was just lying in the road, and to figure just what the heck was going on,” Robledo reportedly said. As he and others provided first aid, neighbors told a police officer where the shooter was.“We were telling [the officer], ‘He’s down there’ … The cop just went straight into action,” Robledo recalled.Middle school teacher Nick Atkins, who lives on a street locked down by police, said the neighborhood is largely calm. “You never think it’s going to happen here, and all of a sudden, in a tiny little town, it comes here,” Atkins reportedly said.After the shooting, New Mexico’s congressional delegation issued a statement that read: “One thing is clear: Congress needs to act on gun violence NOW.”The statement alluded to how the federal government last year enacted bipartisan congressional legislation that expanded background checks for the youngest gun buyers while funding mental health and violence intervention programs. But, the statement added, Monday was “a painful reminder that we must do more”.“We are committed to fighting for sensible gun safety measures that will keep New Mexicans safe,” the statement said.Numerous mass shootings have afflicted large cities and small towns, maiming and killing innocents in places ranging from schools to synagogues to shopping malls. But Congress and many state legislatures have done little beyond last year’s legislation, such as a measure that would raise the minimum age people must reach before being able to legally buy guns.Instead, many politicians continue trying to deflect discussions about gun control by saying the focus should be on praying for victims of violence or arming would-be bystanders such as schoolteachers and training them to confront mass shooters themselves.Some officials have even taken steps to insulate the gun industry from potential lawsuits. Several weeks after a shooting at a Nashville, Tennessee, school left six dead, among them three nine-year-olds, the Republican state governor signed legislation that provides additional legal protections for firearm and ammunition sellers, dealers, and manufacturers, ABC News reported.The killings in Farmington left the US with at least 225 mass shootings so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines as a mass shooting as one in which four or more victims are injured or killed.While Monday’s case wasn’t classified a mass murder, which is when four or more victims are slain, the US has been on pace this year to set the highest number of mass murders in recent memory, according to data from the Gun Violence Archive. There have been 21 mass murders so far this year as of Tuesday. There were 31 mass killings in 2019, 21 in 2020, 28 in 2021 and 36 in 2022.Agencies contributed to this report More

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      in US Politics

      Suspect named in baseball bat attack at Democratic congressman’s office

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      Police in Virginia on Monday named the suspect in a violent attack in which two staffers for a Democratic congressman were assaulted with a baseball bat, requiring hospital treatment.Xuan Kha Tran Pham, 49, was arrested after the attack at Gerry Connolly’s office in Fairfax. Connolly told CNN one staff member was hit in the head while the other, an intern on her first day in the job, was hit on the side.Connolly said the attacker, a constituent, caused widespread damage to the office, including shattering glass and breaking computers.“The thought that someone would take advantage of my staff’s accessibility to commit an act of violence is unconscionable and devastating,” Connolly said in a statement.He told CNN the suspected attacker “was filled with out of control rage”.A police spokesperson, Sgt Lisa Gardner, said police were called at about 10.50am. Connolly was not at the office, Gardner said, adding that some staff members hid during the attack.Acts of political extremism, including ones targeting lawmakers, have become increasingly common in the US.Last October, Paul Pelosi, husband of the former Democratic House speaker Nancy Pelosi, was attacked in his home in San Francisco by a man armed with a hammer.Afterwards, the Michigan representative Debbie Dingell predicted “somebody is going to die”.Speaking to Axios, Dingell said that two years previously, after the now fired Fox News host Tucker Carlson broadcast a segment about her, she “had men outside my home with assault weapons that night”.The Democratic governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, was the target of a rightwing kidnap plot foiled by law enforcement.Justice Samuel Alito, meanwhile, has complained of an increase in threats to members of the supreme court. Last year, a man was charged with attempting to kill Brett Kavanaugh, like Alito a member of the 6-3 conservative majority.Connolly, 73, has represented the 11th congressional district in Virginia since 2009. A prominent Democratic voice in Congress, he frequently spars with Republicans who control the House.Connolly last week criticised CNN’s decision to host Donald Trump for a town hall in New Hampshire, telling Fox News that the event was a “travesty”.“Why would you put a liar and a convicted criminal on a town hall?” Connolly asked during his appearance on the network. “And why would you give him that privilege? … To me, it is frankly reprehensible.”Trump is not a convicted criminal. Last week, in a civil case in New York, he was found liable for sexual assault and defamation against the writer E Jean Carroll.On Monday, Connolly thanked police and emergency medical professionals. The person who attacked his office was taken into custody, he said, adding that his focus was on ensuring his staff members were “receiving the care they need”.“I have the best team in Congress,” Connolly said. “My district office staff make themselves available to constituents and members of the public every day.”Mark Warner, one of two Democratic senators from Virginia, said: “Intimidation and violence – especially against public servants – has no place in our society. This is an extraordinarily disturbing development, and my thoughts are with the staff members who were injured.”Jason Miyares, the Republican attorney general of Virginia, wished Connolly’s staff members well and said: “Political violence is always unacceptable. The coward who did this should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”But Dan Goldman, a Democratic congressman from New York, linked the attack to remarks about political violence by Republicans.“This is horrifying,” Goldman wrote. “From ‘very fine people on both sides’” – which Donald Trump said about violence at a far-right march in Virginia in 2017 – “to calling January 6 a ‘peaceful protest’, there are serious consequences when elected officials refuse to condemn or outright glorify political violence.” More

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      ‘America is broken’: FBI criticized for mass-shooting survival video

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      A newly resurfaced FBI video purportedly training Americans to give themselves their best chance of surviving a deadly mass shooting is drawing scorn across the US and abroad.In the video, released in 2020 by the US’s top law enforcement agency, actors portraying everyday Americans explain to viewers ways in which they could at least survive – or, preferably, even stop – a mass shooting once the bullets start flying.“If European countries want to deter brain drain to the US they should just play this FBI video to their soon-to-be graduates,” the European tech investor Michael Jackson said on his LinkedIn profile, which has more than 134,000 followers.Jackson, who shared a link to the video, added that the well-documented gun problem in the US – where rates of mass gun violence are much higher than they are in Europe and in many other parts of the world – was hurting its standing with tourists and its companies’ prospects of hiring talented employees from overseas.Another typical reaction to the video was on Twitter from an Oklahoma scholarship foundation leader who wrote: “America is broken. Instead of addressing the cause of the carnage, we’re talking about how to survive a massacre like it’s a damn tornado.”The video begins with a scene of a bustling bar filled with people. A fight breaks out and then the sudden eruption of gunshots sends the crowd into a panic, with people rushing to find an exit or a hiding spot.A waitress spots a neon red exit sign and proceeds to explain to viewers techniques to avoid getting shot.“Running makes you harder to hit and improves your chances of survival,” she says as she runs down a stairway with a group of people.When she makes it downstairs and out the door, she is confronted by police pointing a gun at her. Still out of breath and distressed, the waitress reminds the camera to always keep “empty hands up” and “follow their instructions” when faced with law enforcement.Another woman hiding under a table then says to find another room and barricade the door if it’s not possible to escape. She ushers every person around her into a nearby closet and reminds viewers to turn their phones off.She then says to find anything that could be wielded as if it were a weapon – a fire extinguisher or a flower vase would do – and prepare to attack if the shooter breaks down the door.“Lock and barricade the door,” she instructs viewers as the gunshots can be heard firing in the background.It doesn’t address what to do if the attacker has a high-powered rifle and can fire through the door and walls enclosing the room.Someone is later shown not having a tourniquet but still properly applying pressure to a woman with a bleeding gunshot wound.Toward the end of the video, a man is shown trapped behind the bar with all exits blocked. He tells his audience: “I gotta stay hidden. But I’m no victim. I’m ready for this.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHe lays out an elaborate plan that ends with him seizing the shooter’s gun, which occasionally happens but can cost people their lives if attempted unsuccessfully.The video ends with a narrator offering a word of encouragement – “you can survive a mass shooting if you’re prepared” – and directs viewers to the website fbi.gov/survive.The video resurfaced recently as the US is on pace this year to set the record for the highest number of mass killings in recent memory, according to data from the Gun Violence Archive.The online reference site’s data recently showed the country in 2023 was likely to see 60 mass killings, which involve four or more victims who are slain.There were 31 mass killings in 2019, 21 in 2020, 28 in 2021 and 36 in 2022.As of Monday morning, there had been at least 224 mass shootings in the US so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting as one in which four or more victims are injured or killed.Congress has been unable to meaningfully restrict access to guns despite the accelerated pace of mass shootings in the US this year.Actually stopping a mass shooter as a civilian is exceptionally rare, according to Texas State University’s Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training Center. Less than 3% of more than 430 active attacks in the US ended with a civilian firing back from 2000 to 2021.A bystander who confronted and disarmed an attacker during a mass shooting that left five people dead and 17 others wounded at a Colorado LGBTQ+ club last year was a US army veteran who had previously gone to war. Richard Fierro had served three tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan. More