Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin, emotional and angry after a mass shooting in one of the city’s most popular entertainment districts left four people dead and 17 injured, said politics need to be put aside in the name of public safety.
Police say a gun with a Glock switch was among the weapons fired Saturday night on the city’s Southside, resulting in the carnage left behind.
Those conversion devices, which turn a semi-automatic weapon into a fully automatic weapon that unleashes all of its bullets in just seconds, don’t belong on any city street, he said.
Though illegal under federal law, there is no state law that makes Glock switches illegal.
Woodfin said that needs to change and called for a ban with a 10-year sentence for anyone caught with a switch, 25 years for a person who shoots someone using a switch and survives, and an automatic life sentence if the victim dies.
“We, all of us, as a community owe it to (the victims and their families) to do everything we can to take these shooters, these killers, off our streets,’’ he said.
“I am an elected official. My position is nonpartisan,’’ Woodfin said. “In this moment, I don’t give a damn about partisan, I really don’t care about Democratic politics, Republican politics, what I care about and what is my concern, my top priority is public safety.”
Saturday’s deadly shooting was the second mass shooting in the city in just two months, and the third quadruple homicide in Birmingham this year.
“This is not the first occasion, unfortunately, in 2024, where we’ve seen the style of weapons, the number of bullets on the scene, possibly converted automatic weapons being used in our streets,’’ he said. “This is a solvable problem…. But you’ve got to give us the tools to solve these issues.”
Woodfin said he often tells people, “When America gets a cold, it’s possible that Birmingham gets the flu.”
“We’ve seen this in this 60s with segregation, at the height of it unfortunately we were the poster child and find ourselves in 2024 where gun violence is at an epidemic level and an epidemic crisis in our country and unfortunately the City of Birmingham finds itself unfortunately at the tip of that spear,’’ he said.
“Is it solvable? Yes. Does it require everyone to come together? The answer’s also yes.”
Woodfin said at the height of gun violence in the U.S., which was in the 1990s, the ban on assault weapons was passed.
“Our country, and not just our country but the City of Birmingham, in that 10-year window saw the lowest form of gun violence,’’ he said.
“Now some will say I’m getting too political, but I am a politician so I need to speak the truth and publicly share my thoughts and feelings so people can understand what’s at stake here.”
Since the assault weapons ban was lifted, he said, the city has not only seen a jump in homicides, but in the style of weapons used in those killings – guns outfitted with switches.
“That requires laws be changed to get the necessary tools for police to enforce,’’ he said.
“We don’t have any interest in this whole debate about Second Amendment rights,’’ he said.
“We don’t have any interest in people who want to protect their homes, the militia, whatever else you want to say, there’s a certain element in this city who are too comfortable riding around with semi-automatic weapons, automatic weapons, conversion switches and everything else whose only intent, hell-bent intent, is to harm people, shoot people and kill people.”
“We need the necessary tools. We don’t have home rule, so I want to work with the state to solve this problem,’’ Woodfin said. “I’m not here to point fingers.”
“Glock switches are federally outlawed. And while they’re outlawed on my left hand, you also have Congress not giving ATF the actual organization design to enforce and take them off the street. You’re cutting their resources at the federal level,’’ he said.
“You see, we are prepared to be overly aggressive, dogmatic if you will and go after every shooter in the city. But as it stands, they can ride around with no permit, they can ride around with any type of gun,’’ the mayor said. “If you want to protect your home, cool. But what are you going to do for us, the people who you say are responsible for public safety?”
“You take this hand, and you put it behind our back, you take this hand, and you put it behind our back, then you put a blindfold over our eyes and tell us we’re responsible for solving this issue,’’ he said.
“There are a lot of emotions I have,’’ Woodfin said, “but they pale in comparison to the family members who are waking up to their loved one not being beside them this morning.”
Woodfin said elected officials, local, statewide and national, have a duty to change this “American crisis.”
“We should not allow people to just ride around with any style of weapon …I don’t care what your politics are,’’ he said. “I said a lot. I probably said too much. If you’re offended by it, I don’t care. We have a job to do.”
