Friend,

One of the core reasons I am running for Senate, and something that drives my work as a Congresswoman, is addressing the issues that are *truly* harming our children. Gun violence is the #1 killer of Americans under 21. That’s not a political statement, that’s a fact. In 2022, over 6,000 children 18 and younger were killed or injured due to gun violence in our communities, in our schools, by suicide, and by accident.

With the Michigan State shooting this year, and the Oxford High School shooting in 2021, I became the first Congresswoman to represent a district with two school shootings. And while I, like so many Michiganders, grew up with guns and then later carried weapons in three tours in Iraq alongside the military, the issue of gun violence has me by the throat. After the MSU shooting and manhunt, I received calls from Republican constituents that I know to be avid hunters and sportsmen, and they all have the same message: No one can stand to see their children dying in what should be their sanctuaries, and we need to do something to protect our babies.

That shift is why I find one of my Republican opponents’, Mike Rogers, comments on an assault weapons so telling: Two days after the mass shooting in Maine, where 18 people were killed by a mass shooter using an AR-10, Rogers went on Fox to reiterate his position that assault weapons are “not the problem” and a ban on these weapons wouldn’t help deal with the the issue of gun violence in America.

The most recent statement by Rogers simply reiterated his lifelong approach to gun safety: despite gun violence killing more children than car accidents since 2020, the government should take no further steps to try and mitigate risk. He has an A rating from the NRA and supported ending the assault weapons ban in 2004. But just in case you were wondering if his years away had changed him, or he might try and take a less tone-deaf position, or that watching the pain of families in Oxford or around MSU would have given him the courage to vote to protect kids, it has not. It appears he wasn’t aware that his comments would come just days before the independent review of the Oxford shooting would be published, making clear there are indeed legislative gaps to be filled to prevent a repeat of history.

Given the above, it’s clear that the issue of gun safety will clearly be a point of serious contrast in this Senate race. We don’t need another senator who refuses to take up even basic gun safety legislation, and who lives in fear of the NRA turning against him. And we don’t need another senator who can’t open their hearts and their eyes to the direct threat to our kids.

Thank you,

Elissa Slotkin