members of congress we should be having hearing, discussions, and even bills that are out there bringing to the floor for regular order. >> why do you think that on those issues there can't be a coming together? >> i would, you know, we have seen so many of these tragedies occur in this country, whether it be in schools, places of worship. night clubs. every venue we've had mass shootings and nothing done to date. and i'm so very sorry for the famts had lost of life. >> all of this is available on c-span3.org. house speaker paul ryan is it here we'll take you live. >> our first thoughts are with the families those who are lost. we know at least five people are fighting for their lives and we need to pray for each one of those people fighting for their lives. we thank god for law enforcement and heros in the school. i want to offer this. there are a lot of worry that is come with being a parent of

teenagers. we have three of them. but this is the nightmare. this is pure evil. for these kids, yesterday should have been typical high school day. in an instant this became the worst day of their lives. you know, i was looking at this this morning, i go back to in message that one of the students sent to her mom. she said if i don't make it, i love you and i appreciate everything you did for me. amid all that terror for her to think of love and gratitude for her parents, we can learn a lot from our kids. this is one of the moments where we need to step back and count our blessings. we need to think less about taking sides and fighting each other politically and just pulling together. this house and the whole country stands with the parkland community. i'm going take some questions, but we started late here and i'm going to be brief because i have to get upstairs to the chair. >> thank you, mr. speaker.

when you talk about not taking sides. minority leader stood there and was critical of their demands and requests to have a select committee on gun violence, action on background checks, criticized your leadership for saying response to their sit in 2016 was to investigate who was per a scoping. what use is that taking of sides you are referring to? >> as you know, mental health is often a big problem underlying these tragedies. that may be the case here today based on earlier reporting. we passed legislation on mental health. we want to make sure that if someone is in the mental health system, they don't get a job they are not supposed to get a gun. we will find out as facts came out if there is a break down in the system. as you know we passed legislation cleaning up instant check background system. that bill with others is sitting over in the united states senate. so if there is someone who is not supposed to get a gun getting a gun, then we have to figure out why that's happening and if iks that.

that's a legislation. that's a piece of legislation we already passed that's sitting in the senate. and one thing we know is that if there are early indications for mental illness, i this i we probably have to do a better job trying to make sure that people don't get slip through the cracks. >> mr. speaker, should law enforcement be able to confiscate a weapon from someone who has exhibited signs of mental illness? >> like i said before, this sh not the time to jump to some conclusion not knowing the full facts. we have a lot more information we need to know. but if someone who is mentally ill is slipping through the cracks and getting a gun because we have laws on the books, we have a system to prevent people not supposed to get guns from getting guns, and if there are gaps there then we need to look at the gap. that's like the legislation we passed fixing the vix system. >> mr. speaker, why won't you support or allow hearings to move forward on background checks? what is your resistance to that?

>> the fix nics bill which is part of broader bill does fix the background system. roe remember the shooting in texas a man convicted in the air force of domestic violence, he wasn't supposed to get a gun, yet the air force didn't give the records to the instant check system and he got a gun. that's one of the reasons why we passed legislation plugging that loophole making sure that was thes case. so that came from here ings. we had hearings on the gaps in the instant check system. and those hearings led to conclusion that there were gaps that needed to be fixed and that led to legislation that has now passed the house. >> mr. speaker, [ inaudible ] the question i think is so you are saying obviously need to look in if there are gaps and we have to problems we have to address it. something is not right we have to fix. >> yes. >> would you consider a select committee? >> congress should do their job. we passed mental health

legislation two years ago because of the underlying mental health problems behind the shootings. that legislation is now just taking place. that legislation is now being implemented. we from earlier reporting understand there may be some mental health issues with this shooting. so the question is are those laws where they need to be. is it being implemented properly and enforced correctly. remember, we do have laws on the books designed to prevent people with mental illnesses from getting firearms. designed people who have criminal back grunds from getting firearms. the question is just like the texas instance, are those laws working the right way. are their loop holes that need to be plugged. we found loop holes and passed legislation to fix that. >> would you consider [ inaudible ] stand alone bill? or provisions [ inaudible ]? >> our bill is in the senate. hopefully the senate can pass something, then we'll meet in conference like the regular

process. >> conceal and carry. >> that's something in the senate. we'll see if the senate can get conference, then we can figure out what we can do from there. thank you. >> thank you, mr. speaker. >> the speaker headed back to the floor. series of votes under way. you may have heard him mention the house will hold a moment of silence for the shooting that happened yesterday in parkland, florida, a live look at the u.s. capital with their flags and flags across the country half staff because of that. on the senate side majority leader mitch mcconnell announced shortly afternoon the senate will stop from immigration debate and observe a moment of silence. you can follow the debate on senate floor over on c-span 2. and also coming up in about 40 minutes or so, we'll take you live to a briefing on immigration with a bipartisan group of senators who have one