John Cornyn, tapped as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s emissary to bipartisan negotiations on gun legislation, is feeling the pressure after years of congressional failure to get a bill done. If the Senate can’t agree on a legislative response after the killings in Uvalde, Texas, Cornyn said, “it will be embarrassing.”
“It would feed the narrative that we can’t get things done in the public interest,” the 70-year-old former state attorney general told POLITICO in an interview. “I don’t believe that narrative, I believe we can get a bipartisan deal done in the public interest.”
Cornyn’s in a unique position to get the votes on guns, not just because of the latest tragedy that struck his home state. He’s previously teamed up with Democrats on narrow background checks legislation — the most substantive gun bill to clear Congress in the last decade. Not to mention that the former whip wields major influence in a GOP conference where he’s widely viewed as a potential successor to McConnell.
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