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Casey Not Deterred By Senate's Rejection Of Four Gun Control Bills

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The U.S. Senate rejected four bills on Monday concerning gun control. But a local senator is not giving up hope of getting gun legislation passed.

Pennsylvania Democratic Senator Bob Casey says they're back to square one on passing gun control laws, but it's a step in the right direction that they even voted on these bills.

"To begin to really reduce that number of 33,646 Americans killed in 2014, we have to pass a number of pieces of legislation," Casey said.

Casey says the bills that were rejected called for more extensive background checks on gun buyers, and they would have made it harder for people on the terrorist watch list to buy guns.

"We need to keep working on this," the senator said, "and keep the pressure on to finally begin to confront this scourge."

Casey says he's currently working on gun legislation that would cut sales to people involved in hate crimes.

"If you've shown a propensity to engage in hate crimes, use force in those instances, you shouldn't be allowed to have a weapon," he said. "If you have a propensity toward violence and it reaches at least a conviction at a misdemeanor level, you shouldn't have a weapon."

Casey says his fight for more extensive gun control laws is not over and he's currently working on other forms of legislation.

Senator Pat Toomey released the following statement in part: "Today's votes were designed to fail.  They were designed to maximize partisan differences, and minimize our ability to find the common ground needed to actually make progress and save lives.  That is an outrage."

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