DELAWARE/MARYLAND- United States Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) says school shootings happen more than people think.
"To have again 19 elementary school students massacred in their classrooms, to have their teachers killed defending them and to have some describe this as unthinkable, unimaginable when it is entirely too predictable now," Coons said.
Senator Coons during a judiciary committee hearing on Wednesday said it is time to draw attention to gun laws and public safety.
"We have to make it harder for individuals to get access to weapons who have demonstrated the capacity or potential to use them to harm themselves or their families and we have to do more to address gun violence," Coons said.
Congresswoman Lisa Blunt Rochester is co-sponsoring four house resolutions related to gun control. They include background checks, laws on transferring firearms, and making it a crime to knowingly import, sell, manufacture, transfer, or possess a semiautomatic assault weapon or large ammunition feeding device.
Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings is calling for a ban on assault rifles and asking the legislature to pass Senate Bill 3 which creates a permit to purchase firearms.
In a statement on Twitter, Governor John Carney said in part:
"We have made progress here in Delaware, but it isn't enough. I'm committed to working with the General Assembly to continue doing our part to prevent these shameful, appalling, unnecessary tragedies. In the meantime, my heart is with the victims and their families."
Local leaders in Maryland are reaching out to school officers and county police departments to make sure all resources are in place and students and teachers can feel safe going to school.
Senator Mary Beth Carozza (R- SD38) says there are ideas on how to bulk up security.
"There have been some proposals about retired law enforcement, retired veterans to perhaps be on the grounds if we are unable to have a school resource officer at every single school on the Eastern Shore," Carozza said. "I think those are very creative ideas."
Calls for action are in motion to prevent lives from being lost and families from being broken again.