The parents of a child shot at a Minneapolis Catholic church last week pressed Vice President JD Vance on Wednesday to take actions on guns, urging him to advocate for bipartisan legislation that would address the nation's "mass shooter problem."
Vance and second lady Usha Vance met with several families affected by the shooting as they surveyed the human toll of the gruesome attack. They made stops at both Annunciation Catholic Church, where the shooting took place, and Children’s Minnesota Hospital, which is treating some injured victims.
Harry Kaiser, whose 12-year-old daughter, Lydia, has been hospitalized since the shooting, told reporters that he read a note directly to Vance during a meeting at the hospital. He said he asked Vance to “earnestly support the study of what is wrong with our culture.”
That study, Kaiser said, needs to explore why “we are the country that has the worst mass shooter problem.”
“Will you please promise to pursue, despite powerful lobbies, some commonsense bipartisan legislation as a starting point so we can come out of our corners and find the values that we share — so that this time some progress is made?” said Kaiser, a gym teacher at Annunciation School.
“Thoughts and prayers haven’t been enough,” he added.
Kaiser acknowledged that finding an effective solution to the gun epidemic would be difficult but warned of the danger of the growing apathy around the issue.
“I don’t claim to have the answers, but we have to commit to looking,” Kaiser said. “Then we can feel good about defending life.”
Kaiser did not say how Vance responded to their message.
Kaiser's daughter is one of 15 children injured in the shooting, alongside three adult victims. Two children, Fletcher Merkel, 8, and Harper Moyski, 10, were killed.
Vance had previously sparred with critics who bashed offerings of “thoughts and prayers” after the Minnesota shooting as weak and ineffective. He called the criticisms about expressions of prayer "bizarre" and part of "weird left wing culture wars."
But in comments to reporters after Wednesday's visit, he struck a different tone, calling his conversations with grieving community members “heartbreaking but also very gratifying.”
"They were rational, reasonable people despite their grief, and I can’t imagine what I would be like in this moment of heartbreak," Vance said. "All they ask is that we look very seriously at the root causes, that we look very seriously at ways to prevent crazy people who are about to shoot up a school from getting access to firearms."
Reflecting on Vance's visit, Lydia’s mother, Leah Kaiser, referred to school principal Matt DeBoer’s frequent quoting of an African proverb that says, “When you pray, move your feet.”
“Vice President Vance, you have enormous authority. Please, use this moment to move your feet and transcend our political divides to promote peace and unity and hope. This is what the people of the United States will hold you accountable to,” she said.
Vance’s office did not respond to a request for comment about his response to the Kaisers’ message. The vice president referred to the family in remarks to reporters following his visit to the Minneapolis hospital.
In those remarks, Vance expressed a desire to "do something" to decrease the prevalence of mass shootings, saying, "We should be investigating people who are planning on targeting kids." He framed the 23-year-old accused of being behind the attack as showing "clear signs of derangement" that "slipped through the cracks."
Vance has previously suggested that the "mental health crisis" is among the root causes of mass shootings.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has been making plans for a potential special session to consider restrictive gun legislation this month, a senior aide told NBC News. Vance deflected when he asked whether he supported the effort but said it is important that state lawmakers "actually take steps that are durable and that are going to work."
"Look, I’m not going to tell the Minnesota lawmakers or the governor exactly how they should respond to this tragedy," Vance said. "There’s a strong desire from across the political spectrum to do something so these shootings are less common."
While he was at the hospital, Vance spoke on the phone with Weston Halsne, a fifth grade student who had a bullet fragment lodged in his neck that doctors say narrowly missed his carotid artery, Vance's office said.
Earlier in the day, the second couple held a two-hour private meeting at Annunciation Catholic School with church leaders and the parents of the two children killed in the attack. They also visited the church sanctuary, the site of the shooting, to pay their respects to the victims and their families, the vice president's office said.
