Amy Schumer Joins Sen. Chuck Schumer, Her Cousin, to Fight for U.S. Gun Control

“I have a lot of press conferences but I almost never get this much attention,“ Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-New York) told a crammed roomful of reporters in Manhattan on Monday morning.

The draw was his cousin — It Girl comedian and newfound activist Amy Schumer, who was also in attendance — but their joint message was somber.

“I’m not sure why this man chose my movie to end those two lives and injure nine others, but it was very personal for me,” Amy Schumer told the room, referring to a Louisiana shooter who recently targeted a movie theater showing her new film, Trainwreck. Two women were killed and nine others injured.

“We always find out how the shooter got their gun,” she continues, “and it’s always something that never should have happened in the first place.”

So Sen. Schumer is introducing a three-pronged plan to tighten gun control in America.

• First, according to his office, the senator has proposed new legislation that will reward states who “submit all necessary records into the background check system” and penalize states who don’t.
• Second, he has asked the Department of Justice to release a report “comparing all states’ standards for involuntary mental health commitment,” along with another report offering “federal recommendations” for upping these standards.
  
• Third, he has asked Congress to increase funding for mental-health and substance-abuse programs.
  

Sen. Schumer is a Brooklyn native and longtime resident of Park Slope.

His cousin Amy got involved in the gun-control debate after Sarah Clements, the daughter of a Sandy Hook shooting survivor and a big fan of Amy’s, wrote her an open letter on Medium. Clements urged the comedian to use her status “our generation’s epitome of what it means to be a strong, powerful, self-aware champion for the experiences and truths of being a woman and an American today“ as a platform for the issue.

Amy has previously said of her cousin Chuck: “He knows I exist. I have run into him a few times in NYC, but I highly doubt he has ever seen my act.”