Sandy Hook families gather, Toomey speaks on gun control

WASHINGTON - The event was scheduled months ago, well before nine people were killed while praying in a South Carolina church.

But that shooting added a fresh, raw layer of emotion to Tuesday's inaugural Sandy Hook Promise dinner here.

Arranged by relatives of victims in the 2012 Newtown, Conn., school massacre, family members and lawmakers gathered in the hope of furthering their work to prevent gun violence. Last week's slaughter underscored that mass shootings have failed to change the politics of gun control.

President Obama and his allies have acknowledged that if they couldn't pass tougher gun laws after 20 children and six educators died at Sandy Hook Elementary School, they won't have a chance after Charleston.

Sen. Pat Toomey knows. The Pennsylvania Republican sponsored a bill to expand background checks after the Newtown shooting, but saw his effort fall short. "I'm not aware that a lot of votes have changed," he said Tuesday.

Once endorsed by the NRA, Toomey was one of three honorees at the dinner. He used the event to renew his call for expanding background checks.

"I'm convinced that more background checks will save lives," he told more than 250 people who filled a Ritz-Carlton ballroom. "It's true that more background checks won't stop every tragedy. But we know it will stop some."

His comments were unusual for a Republican - most in the GOP have either rejected talk of new gun laws or sidestepped the issue.

Gov. Christie, for instance, last week told the Faith and Freedom Coalition in Washington: "Laws can't change this, only the good will and the love of the American people can let those folks know that that act was unacceptable, disgraceful."

Republicans control both chambers of Congress, and most believe new gun laws will infringe on Second Amendment rights.

By contrast, the 18 honorary leaders of the Sandy Hook Promise dinner were all Democrats. Some vowed to keep fighting.

"We are not going away," said Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut. He noted that 54 senators had supported Toomey's background check bill - but that was still six votes shy of what it needed to advance. His colleague Christopher Murphy (D., Conn.) called the lack of Senate discussion on the issue "a moral outrage."

In a room bathed in green light - the color of pins Sandy Hook families wear - the talk turned to the latest tragedy.

"Our hearts were broken once again last week in Charleston," said Nicole Hockley, whose son, Dylan, was 6 when he died at Newtown. "Broken hearts do not make change. Action is the only thing to stop these tragedies."

She and other leaders of Sandy Hook Promise said they were looking beyond Congress to make progress, hoping community programs instead would help stem the violence.

"We understand the landscape better now, and we know that it's going to be small steps, and it's not all about legislation," said Mark Barden, a Sandy Hook Promise founder whose 7-year-old son Daniel died.

As a video showed Sandy Hook parents describing their slain children, a white-gloved member of the Ritz-Carlton wait staff wiped his eye.

More than he has before, Toomey also opened up about the school shooting, the deadliest in U.S. history.

He said the slaughter by Adam Lanza - with guns legally owned by his mother - was "so shockingly grotesque that it opened a lot of people's eyes. It opened my eyes, too. Kris and I have three school-age children," he said, referring to his wife. "And the idea of them suffering the way the kids did at Sandy Hook, it's just, it's unthinkable for us, as it is to any parent."

"So when the gun issue returned to the Senate in the wake of Sandy Hook, I decided it was time for me to step out from my previously quiet position, and instead to take a more vocal role."

The audience applauded.

Toomey said he still supports the Second Amendment and said law-abiding citizens should be allowed to buy guns. But he stood behind the argument he made when he became the Republican sponsor of the bill, with Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.), to expand background checks to cover more purchases, including those at gun shows or online.

"If you can't pass the background check," Toomey said, "then you are exactly the kind of person who shouldn't have a gun."

An NRA spokesman did not return a message seeking comment.

As he gears up for one of the most watched 2016 Senate races - during a presidential election year that is expected to send a surge of Democrats to the polls - that stance could help the Republican senator repel attempts to paint him as a right-wing extremist.

"Sen. Toomey's always fighting against a perception that he might be too conservative for a more moderate state," said Muhlenberg College pollster Chris Borick. "His efforts on background checks were very much in line with the public opinion in the commonwealth."

And even in a state with a strong culture of gun ownership, he likely has enough credibility with conservatives to withstand any backlash, Borick said.

One potential Toomey opponent, however, said the senator gave up too quickly after the Senate vote, calling him a "fair-weather friend."

"Why should we applaud somebody who took one vote? Where is he the next day in battle?" former Democratic Rep. Joe Sestak asked this year. Sestak added, "If you believe in something, constantly fight for it."

Sestak aides pointed out that Toomey, after Sandy Hook, voted against bills to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and that the senator once quipped that his idea of gun control was "a steady aim."

On Tuesday, Toomey said he had no regrets about sponsoring the bill, though he acknowledged that there is no obvious path forward. He said he would look for opportunities to move just a piece of it.

"My only regret," he said, "really, is that it took me so long to raise my voice on this very important issue."

@JonathanTamari www.philly.com/capitolinq