Good morning, Bulletin readers. In your end-of-week roundup, the House approved a measure that could disarm more domestic abusers, while in the Senate, plans are afoot for a bipartisan bill to incentivize more states to create mechanisms for pre-emptively removing guns from people who pose an extreme risk.
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WHAT TO KNOW TODAY
A gun control group is grading banks on their ties to gunmakers and the gun lobby. Guns Down America, which was created after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, issued a report card ranking 15 financial institutions. Half-a-dozen banks got Fs, including Chase, Wells Fargo, and TD Bank. Citibank got the highest grade, a B.
The House overwhelmingly approved funding reauthorization for the Violence Against Women Act. The measure passed 263-158 on Thursday, with 33 Republican representatives voting in favor. (See the full roll call results here.) The reauthorization fight now moves to the Senate. The NRA came out against the House version because of gun restrictions incorporated by Democrats, one of which would close the “boyfriend loophole” that exempts abusive dating partners from the federal gun ban for domestic violence offender. Dating partner violence comprises the vast majority of domestic incidents.
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham is drafting a federal bill that would incentivize more states to create red flag laws. Graham, who held a hearing on extreme-risk protection orders on March 26, confirmed his plans with BuzzFeed News. He said he’s been talking to Democrat Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut in an effort to make the new legislation bipartisan.
A 10-year-old girl died in a possible road rage shooting in Arizona. Summerbell Brown was fatally shot as her father pulled into the driveway of their Phoenix home on Wednesday by someone who’d been following them in a pickup truck. Her father was critically wounded. Police said neither driver knew each other. It was the second incident of apparent armed road rage in Phoenix that day: A few hours earlier, two people were wounded by stray bullets when one driver opened fire on another.
The Texas Senate approved a bill that lets school marshals carry concealed guns. The legislation would eliminate a statewide requirement that the armed employees, whose identities are a secret to all but a few local officials, keep their firearms locked up on K-12 and junior college campuses. If it passes, schools would be able to decide for themselves whether they want their marshals to be armed.
Meanwhile in Florida, hundreds of teens flocked to the state Capitol to protest arming teachers. About 200 students joined the rally in Tallahassee on Wednesday. Among them was Robert Schentrup, 19, whose 17-year-old sister, Carmen, was killed in the Parkland shooting. “I had some teachers who had short tempers with students,” he told The Sun Sentinel. “I worry about firearms escalating situations.”
The elderly perpetrator of a murder-suicide in California had his guns confiscated during a wellness check months earlier. Police say Richard Stewart, 76, used someone else’s gun when he killed his wife, Patricia, 75, in Petaluma last week. His own guns were taken by officials during a welfare check in October when Patricia called police and said Stewart threatened to kill them both. Family members say he’d been recently diagnosed with dementia.
ONE LAST THING
A Las Vegas massacre survivor says his employer told him to “get over” his PTSD. In a suit centering on the lasting psychological scars of gun violence, Charles Giampaolo, an account executive at an elevator repair company in Connecticut, is suing his employer for demoting him and withholding commissions after he developed post-traumatic stress disorder stemming from the 2017 massacre. Giampaolo, 36, escaped physical injury, but his father-in-law was shot to death in front of him, and two other family members were wounded. At a large work event a month after the shooting, he suffered a panic attack and had to leave. Anxiety, sleeplessness, and claustrophobia followed. After that, the suit alleges, his employers told him to “suck it up” and accused him of acting entitled. He left the company a few months later. The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages.
