million in the country already. they are a sporting rifle. and it is something that lot of people for purposes of going out, target shooting, in my state they used them to shoot prairie dogs and other varmints. so i think that there are legitimate reasons. reporter: what else may not be included? expanding background checks on gun show sales and over the internet. why is it so hard to get republicans on board behind this? you should ask the republicans. but you ve been working on this issue for a decade. you know. frustrating. reporter: as sources tell us, mitch mcconnell has expressed an openness to being bag an increase into the age of 21 to purchase those semi automatic rifles. current law is in the age of 18. but privately he has expressed an openness to backing that. but even so, that is unlikely to get into a final deal because republicans are opposed to this for the most part and mitch
gun control, has been gone for a long time. they cannot be moved. it is a national disgrace. prairie dogs, and varmints. that is the response to 19 children and two teachers being murdered. less than two weeks after 11 people at a grocery store. eugene robertson, mark mckinnon, i thank you both for joining us tonight. we re gonna leave it there. before our special primary coverage continues at the top of the hour with ayman mohyeldin we want to leave you with a little more of matthew mcconaughey s important call to action. we ve got to take a sober, humble, and honest look in the mirror. and we brand ourselves based on what we truly value. what we truly value. we gotta make some real courage, and honor our immortal obligations instead of our party affiliations. enough with the counter punching. enough of the invalidation of the other side.
constituents demanding an end to mass shootings. as negotiations continue, cnn chief congressional correspondent manu raju pressed lawmakers about ar-15s and why people need them and he got a range of responses. here it is. why do you think that people need to have ar-15s in this country in. you re talking about a constitutional right to keep and bear arms. people who are law abiding citizens are in good mental health and aren t a threat to the public. in my state, they use them to shoot prairie dogs and other types of varmints, so i think there are legitimate reasons why people would want to have them. that s used for sporting events, for sporting activities all the time. why not raise the age to 21 for people buying semi-automatic rifles? we re talking about a lot of things, and what we re talking about most are background checks, juvenile records, the areas where we can get
should be prosecuted, but i do think that they ll get to the point that might have an impact on the midterms, and more importantly, on reform, to harden these democratic institutions. what if we just had an impact on one or two republican senators. what if we just had an impact on people that you worked with. that s what i want to get to. we showed pictures of quotes from people who have been friends of mine for 25 years saying, absolutely, egregious things about why ar-15s are needed to kill varmints and prairie dogs and feral pigs and raccoons. and, you know, two things can be true at once, i guess. you can know them, you can like them, you can still be shocked by the things they say and the decisions they make. but i m wondering as you now see january 6th and we ve had quite some time to take it on board
these are not serious arguments. we have children who are still being buried. we know there s going to be another mass shooting coming up. we know that because we ve had, what, 240 mass shootings so far this year and we re not even half way through the year. and they re talking about ferrell pigs and prairie dogs? it s disgraceful. as i said before f we took a step back and just said, how does this look? to people that disconnected from the political system. how is this going to look 10, 15, 20 years from now that we had members of the united states senate that allowed little children to continue to be gunned down with military weapons because they wanted to protect their constituent s rights to shoot prairie dogs and varmints. yeah. you can shoot a prairie dog with a shotgun. you don t need an ar-15 to