When will we say ‘enough already’?

“America isn’t easy,” said the president, who was in the midst of a difficult re-election campaign. He was speaking to a packed press conference that was being broadcast live to the nation from the White House press room. “America is advanced citizenship…,” he said. “You’ve gotta want it bad, ’cause it’s gonna put up a fight….”

At issue was his endorsement of a compromise crime bill that did little to nothing to alleviate America’s gun violence problem. He had endorsed the bill, he said, because “nobody ever won an election by talking about gun control.” Then came a startling confession from a president (or any candidate) intent on staying in office. Said the president, “I was so busy keeping my job, I forgot to do my job. Well, that ends right now.”

Then he dropped his bombshell. He no longer supports the compromise crime bill. “Tomorrow morning, the White House is sending a bill to Congress for its consideration. It’s a bill that,” among other things, “bans the purchase of handguns by private citizens.”

“I’m going to get the guns,” he said. “And I’m going to tell you why. Because in this country, you don’t fight your battles with guns. You fight your battles with your vote.…”

So said this “American president,” who went on to win big on Election Night. As he proudly proclaimed when he reworked his opponent’s campaign slogan, “I am Andrew Shepherd. And I am the president.”

Sadly, though, this president exists only in an idealistic film called “The American President.” Michael Douglas played Andrew Shepherd, and two particular lines in his press conference speech explain why there has never been an Andrew Shepherd in the White House and likely never will be. First, a president, especially in his or her first term, is “so busy keeping [that] job” that he or she forgets to do that job — keeping campaign promises and keeping America safe and secure. A big reason why that is, especially when a hot button issue like gun control is involved, is, in Andrew Shepherd’s words, because “nobody ever won an election by talking about gun control,” or abortion rights, or global warming, and so forth.

And we, the People of These United States, are stuck with wishy-washy Democrats and Republicans we elected because they were the only real choices we had on Election Day, and those hot button issues never get resolved.

On December 13, we saw the result of that at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. (Two more followed over the next two days, by the way.) And, of course, we saw it on a beach in Sydney, Australia.

Australia supposedly has some of the toughest gun control laws in the world, but that’s irrelevant because it misses the point. Gun ownership is the point, as Andrew Shepherd understood. As a first step, he wanted to keep handguns out of the hands of private citizens.

“Guns don’t kill people,” we’re often told; “People kill people.” True, but the only way to prevent people from killing people with guns of any kind is to take those guns away — period. Does a hunter really need an AR-15 to shoot down a quail? There’d be much more lead in that bird than there’d be meat.

If a person doesn’t need to own a gun — of any kind — that person should not be allowed to buy that gun.

Of course, if you want to kill someone, you can always use a knife, just as Nick Reiner is said to have done when he allegedly killed his parents. But did anyone ever hear of a knife-wielding terrorist killing 15 people and wounding somewhere around 40 people with a knife — and at a distance, no less?

December 14, as it turned out, marked the 13th anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting. Twenty children and six adults died at the school that day (the shooter, Adam Lanza, killed his mother earlier that day); two others were wounded. Would we have marked such an anniversary if Lanza had a knife instead? Would the parents of those 20 children be living their lives grieving for what could have been, what their children could have accomplished in their lives, what their grandchildren would have been like?

We’re told that homicide rates by guns have climbed down from their historic highs during the covid-19 years of 2020 through 2022, but this statistic is deceptive. Epidemiologists and statisticians call this a “regression to the mean,” meaning that these numbers are merely returning to the ever-rising pre-pandemic rates, which were already hugely frightening.

While street-level violence has fallen, gun suicides are the highest they’ve ever been, and guns of every kind remain the leading cause of death for children and teenagers. Ever since 2020, guns have killed more children and teenagers than have died in car accidents.

Then there is this: If a domestic abuser owns a gun, his partner is five times more likely to be killed. A woman is shot dead by an abusive partner roughly every 10 to 12 hours.

As of December 18, the Gun Violence Archive reported a total of 14,063 gun deaths this year. That’s almost three deaths every two hours of every day. On average, there also were almost 70 gun injuries every single day in 2025.

As of December 18, too, 219 children aged 0-11 and 981 teens were killed by firearms, and 3,066 children of all ages were injured. Clearly, there is no evidence as yet of any kind of a “regression to the mean” where children and teens are concerned.

Experts often refer to “American exceptionalism” when it comes to gun violence. That’s not a cliché; it’s a statistical reality, and it separates us from every other high-income nation. Ours is regarded as the least safe country in the free world. Other Western democracies didn’t even come close to our more than 14,000 gun homicides this year.

This is especially noticeable in the English-speaking world. Canada has a national handgun freeze in place, and assault-style weapons are banned. Because of that, for example, Toronto has set a record for homicides this year — a record low. The United Kingdom recorded its lowest gun crime rate since 2015. The U.K. has a near-total ban on handgun ownership, and there are strict licensing rules and procedures.

Don’t expect to see anything like that happening here. In fact, eliminating gun controls of all kinds is a theme in the current GOP-controlled 119th Congress.

For example, we have S. 119, the “No Retaining Every Gun in a System That Restricts Your Rights Act.” It was introduced by Sen. James E. Risch (R-ID) and has eight Republican co-sponsors. Under the bill, federally licensed firearms dealerships that go out of business will no longer have to turn over their firearm transaction records to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. It would also require the ATF to destroy all the records it already has. These records are the only way law enforcement can trace crime guns sold by defunct dealers. This bill, if ever passed, would effectively blind police to the history of millions of firearms.

In the House, Rep. Tony Wied (R-WI). introduced H.R. 4546, the FIRE Act (Freedom from Improper Regulation and Enforcement). It would bar any level of government — federal, state, or local — from restricting magazine capacity for automatic weapons like the AR-15. It also would prohibit agencies from enforcing existing magazine capacity limits.

Another House bill, H.R. 38, bears the title the “Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act.” Introduced by Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC), it would require all states to recognize concealed-carry rights from other states (including from permitless or lax-permit states), essentially nullifying the strict public carry laws of states like New York and New Jersey.

On the other hand, there is a bill that was introduced by Rep. Maxwell Frost, a Florida Democrat. His bill, H.R. 1307, would create the Office of Gun Violence Prevention, which would be the clearinghouse for federal efforts to address gun violence. Our two New Jersey senators, Cory Booker and Andy Kim, reworked the bill to add requiring a federal license to buy or possess a firearm, assuming the applicant passes a background check and goes through comprehensive safety training. H.R. 1307 has almost no chance of becoming law in the current Congress.

Evey day so far this year, three children, from newborns though the teen year, died by a gun. Evey day so far this year, nearly nine children and teens were injured by a gun. In other words, there’s no evidence as yet of any kind of a regression to the mean where children and teens are concerned.

Our legislators don’t seem to mind those statistics — but we should.

We must.

The Torah’s pikuach nefesh (sanctity of life) mandate demands that we Jews do whatever it takes to save lives, and that includes bringing this incredibly shameful state of affairs to an end. And, frankly, the Torah demands that of all people, not just Jews.

Andrew Shepherd said it best: In this country, we don’t fight our battles with guns. We fight them with our votes.

The congressional midterm election season is about to begin. The entire House and one-third of the Senate are on the ballot, and so is the future of our country. Before you decide on a candidate to support in 2026, ask yourself how many children have to die today and every day if you get it wrong.

Shammai Engelmayer is a rabbi-emeritus of Congregation Beth Israel of the Palisades and an adult education teacher in Bergen County. He is the author of eight books and the winner of 10 awards for his commentaries. His website is www.shammai.org.