The Denver Post reports on the frustrations of shooting victims like Stephen Barton, hit 25 times by pellets and shrapnel from a shotgun blast a year ago in the Aurora, Colo., movie theater massacre, to find an ear with politicians in Washington, D.C. Barton is perhaps the best-known leader of a small band of committed Aurora shooting victims and parents who have funneled their anger and emotional recovery to the rigors of politics and pushing for change to the nation’s gun laws.
There have been wins in statehouses, including in Colorado and Connecticut, whose governors have signed a handful of new gun-control measures into law in the past 12 months. But Washington is a different story. Despite the stories of struggle and heroism the victims brought to Capitol Hill, positive poll numbers that indicate a majority of Americans supported universal background checks, and the heft of a freshly re-elected president who called for national gun-control legislation, their efforts have fallen short of their hopes.