Sanders and Clinton Disagree on How to Solve America’s Gun Crisis

Both candidates on the Democratic debate stage Sunday night were critical of the proliferation of guns in the U.S., but their solutions on how to fix the problem differed significantly.

During the debate in Flint, Mich., the father of a girl who barely survived an Uber driver’s recent shooting rampage about 150 miles west in Kalamazoo, Mich., asked Senator Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton how they would address this “serious epidemic.”

Clinton responded that she would close “loopholes” that allow gun purchases without background checks, including at gun shows, and that she would hold gun manufacturers accountable by allowing families of crime victims to sue.

“You talk about corporate greed?” she said, referencing Sanders’ frequent attacks on Wall Street. “The gun manufacturers sell guns to make as much money as they can make.”

But Sanders replied that it made little sense to blame law-abiding gun manufacturers for crimes people committed after legally purchasing their weapons.

“What happened at Sandy Hook, what happened in Michigan, what has happened far too often all over this country is a terrible, terrible tragedy, and we have got to do everything we can, as I mentioned a moment ago, to end these mass killings,” Sanders said. “But it, as I understand it, Anderson [Cooper], and maybe I’m wrong, what you’re really talking about is people saying, ‘Let’s end gun manufacturing in America.’ That’s the implications of that, and I don’t agree with that.”