PHOENIX (AP) 鈥� said Thursday that he lamented that school shootings are a 鈥渇act of life" and argued the U.S. needs to harden security to prevent more carnage like the shooting this week that in Georgia.
鈥淚f these psychos are going to go after our kids we鈥檝e got to be prepared for it,鈥� Vance said at a rally in Phoenix. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 have to like the reality that we live in, but it is the reality we live in. We鈥檝e got to deal with it.鈥�
The Ohio senator was asked by a journalist what can be done to stop school shootings. He said further restricting access to guns, as many Democrats advocate, won鈥檛 end them, noting they happen in states with both lax and strict gun laws. He touted efforts in Congress to give schools more money for security.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 like that this is a fact of life,鈥� Vance said. 鈥淏ut if you are a psycho and you want to make headlines, you realize that our schools are soft targets. And we have got to bolster security at our schools. We鈥檝e got to bolster security so if a psycho wants to walk through the front door and kill a bunch of children they鈥檙e not able.鈥�
Vance said he doesn't like the idea of his own kids going to a school with hardened security, 鈥渂ut that's increasingly the reality that we live in.鈥�
He called the shooting in Georgia an 鈥渁wful tragedy," and said the families in Winder, Georgia, need prayers and sympathy.
Earlier this year, , the Democratic presidential nominee, toured the bloodstained Florida classroom building where the 2018 Parkland high school massacre happened. She then announced a program to assist states that have laws allowing police to temporarily seize guns from people judges have found to be dangerous.
Harris, who leads the new White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, has supported both stronger gun controls, such as banning sales of AR-15 and similar rifles, and better school security, like making sure classroom doors don't lock from the outside as they did in Parkland.
Jonathan J. Cooper, The Associated Press
