The Morgan State University community is rattled after Baltimore police say a gunman opened fire into a crowd of people as they were leaving a homecoming event Tuesday night.
Baltimore City Mayor Brandon Scott told theGrio that this incident highlights the need for gun reform and that Congress needs to take action.
“Gun violence has been an epidemic in our country…longer than I’ve been alive,” said Mayor Scott.
“What will it take for those in Congress who all have been on the sidelines and refuse to do anything meaningful around guns to join their colleagues who have been long in the fight? What will it take for them to do something?” he continued.
The Baltimore City mayor told theGrio that Congress should ban ghost guns, assault rifles and printable 3-D guns to curb gun violence.
Around 9 p.m. Tuesday evening, a crowd of people exited the university’s Carl J. Murphy Fine Arts Center following the annual coronation where Mr. and Miss Morgan State University are crowned during homecoming week.
Jamal Brandon, a junior at Morgan State University and the chapter president of the school’s Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, Inc., witnessed the ordeal and told theGrio, “Everything when it first started was going on without a hitch.”
“The coronation went beautifully, and then as we all left the concert hall…to just congregate and just take pictures and whatnot, the shooting apparently started at the new Thurgood [building],” Brandon recalled. “One of the stray bullets hit Murphy, and that’s when people started to panic and started running.”
U.S. Rep. Glenn Ivey, D-Md., told theGrio that he agrees with Mayor Scott.
“I think it’s important for us to make sure we try to have a comprehensive and coordinated approach to fighting gun violence, and I think that includes additional action from Congress for sure,” said the congressman.
“I think part of that is going to include legislative efforts in Congress, legislative efforts in Annapolis and the local jurisdictions.”
Ivey added, “I think we have to be very thorough in working through solutions to this deeply ingrained and horrific problem that we have here in the United States.”
The Maryland lawmaker, who is currently working on legislation that aims to ban assault rifles, told theGrio, “It’s ironic that this is the week we’re remembering Sen. Dianne Feinstein, and she was the primary author of the assault weapons ban that lasted for ten years.”
“[The ban] had a measurable impact in reducing gun violence. We need to try and get back to that,” he said.
Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove, D-Calif., a member of the Gun Violence Prevention Task Force on Capitol Hill, told theGrio that “Congress should be doing more.”
“Unfortunately, in this moment, we’re at a standstill because we don’t have a speaker, and probably one of the reasons why we haven’t been able to take up gun reform is because we had a speaker and a majority that doesn’t care about gun violence,” said Kamlager-Dove.
“They don’t care about young people now having to integrate shooting drills into their daily school activities.”
The California lawmaker told theGrio, “I hope that the next speaker will come in with eyes wide open to recognize that this is a critical issue and gun violence in the United States is an existential threat.”
The incident at Morgan State last night marks the third year in a row that a shooting has taken place on the university’s campus around homecoming.
In 2022, a 20-year-old man was shot while attending a homecoming party on the university’s campus. The victim was in stable condition following the shooting and survived his injuries.
In 2021, while current students and alumni participated in homecoming festivities, a gunman opened fire, shooting an 18-year-old male student in the chest. The victim survived his injuries after being treated at a local hospital.
Mayor Scott said Morgan State University is a “national treasure,” adding, “I call Morgan State, Baltimore’s University, and we’re going to continue to support such a great institution.”
“We won’t let one incident where someone decided to cowardly shoot in a crowd, outshine the greatness that those students and staff and the executive team at Morgan produce each and every day,” said Scott.
At this time, the gunman is still at large, and the Baltimore City Police Department is working in conjunction with the Morgan State University Police Department to investigate the shooting.
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