Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg
U.S. Conference of Mayors
Washington, DC
January 25, 2019

Steve, thank you and good afternoon everyone.  Let me start with a special thanks to Tom Cocoran and staff for putting this all together.

When I was first elected mayor, it was just two months after 9-11 and Tom brought the Conference's winter meeting to New York and that really gave New York City a big lift, so it meant a lot of us and I just wanted to say again, Tom, thank you, you're the greatest.

I also want to thank our host DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, who was with us today and I want to say thank you to at least one other executive in Washington who knows how to keep a government open.  The mayor of this great city, she deserves a real round of applause.

I didn't plan to speak about the shutdown today.  However, I do want to touch on it because it's related to everything else that all of us do and want to talk about: creating jobs, reducing poverty, fighting climate change, increasing public safety, stopping the opioid crisis and list goes on and on and on.  And on all of these issues and many more it is the American mayors that are really hard at work. 

And as Mayor Benjamin mentioned, our foundation created the Bloomberg American Cities Initiative as a way to help all of you tackle tough challenges and accomplish your goals.  And the initiative has brought me all over the country meeting with mayors and talking about the work they're doing and all the big issues I just mentioned.  And everywhere I've gone I've seen mayors in both parties working across the aisle to develop innovative new policies and programs, and to do what people elected you to do, solve problems.  That's what mayors do, and I've always thought the best job in the world is being a mayor.  And if you talk to Ed Randell who had been mayor of Philadelphia and then Governor of the State of Pennsylvania, he would tell you the mayor's job is far and away the best; you really get a chance to do something.

And then there's the federal level of government.  The shutdown has been going on for 35 days, and nearly all of you have seen the effects in your cities and towns.  Can you imagine shutting down your city governments for 35 days?  Inconceivable.

Some 800,000 federal workers aren't getting paid including disgracefully some of our men and women in uniform, and that has ripple effects across businesses in every community.

And then there are the families who can't get a mortgage.  Farmers who aren't getting the payments that their owed, and small business owners who can't get loans to expand and grow.

And as bad as all this has been, and it is really bad, imagine what would happen at the local level if we shut down.  The garbage would pile up and schools and libraries would close, after school programs and daycare centers closed, businesses couldn't get permits to open, families couldn't get access to benefits.  Need to call 9-1-1 to report a crime or a fire or a heart attack?  Good luck.

Let's get real.  People would never stand for it.  They would be outraged and do you know who they would blame?  The mayor of course, and rightly so.  In government the buck stops at the executive's desk.  That's true at the local level as all of you know, but let's not also forget it is true at the federal level.  Mayors could never get away with closing the government, and I don't believe we should let this president get away with it, either.

Now I've never been a partisan guy.  In fact, I've been a Democrat, a Republican, an immigrant—an Independent, and a Democrat again. So if there's anyone who's an expert on party politics, it is me.

But this isn't about party to me.  This is about competence and the lack of it that we are seeing in the White House.  The government shutdown is a complete failure of executive leadership, and it's one of the worst cases of incompetent management I have ever seen.

Now as all of you know, being an executive is a leadership and a management job.  And I've been lucky enough to have that job in both the public and the private sectors.  People always ask me what's the difference between government and business, and I always say, business is a dog eat dog world, and government is exactly the reverse.

There are differences of course, but the fundamental leadership and management principles are basically the same.  In government, if you can't even keep the doors open, and the lights on, you're gonna make matters a whole lot worse for the public.  And that's exactly what's happening.  There have been a lot of stories in the press about all the people who have been hurt by the shutdown. But that's not the end of it.  We're also paying a collective cost as a country.  For five weeks President Trump has forced all debate in Washington to focus on a wall we don't need instead of the real challenges that are crying out for attention, and that all of you are working on, day and night.

I'd like to touch on one of them today.  The one that probably best exemplifies the gulf between Washington and the rest of the country.  And that's gun safety.

Now I don't have to tell you that a mayor's number one job is protecting people's lives, so they can go home to their families each day.  It's the government's most fundamental responsibility.  And it is impossible to meet it by ignoring the fact that criminals and other dangerous people have easy access to guns.

Over the years, I've spent a lot of time traveling around this country with mayors, volunteers and students about gun violence.  Everywhere I go, whether it's Las Vegas, Tulsa, Minneapolis, Atlanta, San Antonio, or any place else, people tell me how important this issue is to them.  And it should be.

Every day, innocent people who might have been saved by common sense gun laws lose their lives.  All of you know this because you see the effects of America's lax gun laws in your communities every day.

Gun homicides are concentrated in our cities and African Americans represent the majority of the victims.  Tragically, guns are the leading cause of death for African American children and teens. And every time a child is struck by a bullet, every time a woman or responding police officer get shot by a domestic abuser, who never should have had a gun in the first place, you get the phone call.  I've been there.  And let me tell you something.  I know those calls and those conversations with families never get any easier.

For mayors, it's not about ideology.  It's about real life.  And that's why there are more than 1,000 current and former mayors in a group called Mayors Against Illegal Guns, including I'm glad to say, many of you here today.

I started the group with a late Boston Mayor, my friend Tom Menino, back in 2006.  Back then practically nobody in Congress would stand up for basic gun safety laws.  The conventional wisdom was if you stood up, the NRA could end your political career.

Now, I never believed that conventional wisdom.  But if there was ever any truth to it, it is certainly dead today, now.

When I left City Hall, our team created a national organization called Every Town for Gun Safety, and we teamed up with a group of mothers for gun safety called Moms Demand Action.  Together those groups are serving as the counterweight to the NRA with a lot of support from you and from your constituents.  We've been making progress in both blue and red states.  And over the past year, 20 states have enacted stronger gun laws, including states where the NRA has long dominated.

Now, not only is the NRA losing around the country.  They are losing in their own backyard.  This hotel is only 20 miles from NRA headquarters, which is just across the river in Virginia.  In 2017 candidates in Virginia for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general, all took on the NRA and they all won their elections.  And if you're looking at the polling data it wasn't that the NRA was just an effective or unconvincing; the NRA's endorsement was toxic in the eyes of suburban voters, women voters and voters overall.  That got the pundits' attention.

Then we all saw what happened in 2018.  People have always favored sensible, common sense gun laws.  But in the midterms millions of Americans stood up and demanded action and candidates responded by making gun safety a top priority.

So this movement is on the march and I know mayors are eager to lead.  But here's is the problem. Many of you are stuck between a rock and a hard place.  Here is what I mean by that.  On one side the federal government does nothing to help you.  On the other side, your state government might block you from even trying to take action.

One way they try is to pass what is called firearms prevention laws—preemption laws, which the NRA has pushed and over 40 states now have these laws.  These laws are intended to restrict cities and towns from passing sensible public safety laws that are tailored to local conditions.

In some states, these preemption laws are also so punitive that city officials can face personal fines or even removal from office, just for passing responsible common sense gun laws that help protect the public.  You can't make this stuff up.  But we also can't accept it.  And if you want to fight back, and defend your local laws in the courts, I can tell you my organization, Every Town for Gun Safety will have your back.

Let me tell you what I mean.  Every Town already works with mayor, police chiefs, parents and gun violence survivors, and more.  And now Every Town has added a team of legal experts to their staff so they can help you protect your right to take local action.

Let me just give you a couple of quick examples.  After Seattle enacted a responsible gun storage ordinance, the NRA sued, naturally.  Well I can tell you that Mayor Jenny Durkin wasn't going down without a fight.  Every Town helped her defend the law in court, and I'm glad to report, they won.

in Columbus, Ohio Mayor Anthony Ginther is fighting in court to defend the city's ban on bump stocks, and we're glad to support him.

We're also helping Missoula, Montana defend its background check law.  We're helping Boulder, Colorado, defend its limits on assault weapons and high capacity magazines.  And we're helping dozens of Florida mayors and cities challenge the state's punitive preemption law, which they did after last year's Parkland shooting.  Every Town lawyers are representing them along with Florida attorneys and several of those mayors are with us today including the Parkland Mayor Christine Hunschofsky, and I want to know this is very personal for them, but we are with you.

Now Every Town is supporting each of these cities because these are fights worth having.  And they're ready to stand with you as well.  Remember, where there's a will, there's a way.  So once you're back home talk to your legal counsel about which fights you might want to take on.  Then call Every Town, and put them to work.

Let me share one final thought with you.  I've devoted many years on how to fight gun violence. When we started, other mayors and I would come to DC for meetings, lawmakers would have hear us out, they'd nod their heads, and then they'd give us a cold shoulder.  But now members of Congress want to talk about gun safety, and the House wasted no time in introducing a background check bill after the last election, and after they were put in office.

So what's changed?  Well it's not just public opinion.  People were outraged long before Parkland, before Charleston and Newtown, and on and on.  We've been outraged for a long time, but now we are organized and that's the key difference.  And strong leadership from mayors has helped to make it happen.  So I want to thank you all for standing up for gun safety when others wouldn't.  I want to urge you to keep up the fight, and take it to the next level.  We're ready to work with you, and I should mention, we work for free.

Helping you protect your cities is one of the best investments I can make in our country as a philanthropist, and together we can really make America safer and stronger and save an awful lot of lives.  So thank you for having me.  I love this Conference, been coming for many, many years. Tom you're the greatest, and Mayor Benjamin you really are the mayors' mayor.  Thank you all for coming and thank you for having me.  Good bye.