California governor says gender needs to be part of the gun debate

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) said on Monday that gun conversations in America needed to include a discussion of gender.

What did he say?

"These shootings overwhelmingly — almost exclusively — are males, boys, men. I do think that is missing in the national conversation," Newsom said, according to Politico. He was addressing a gathering of local officials in San Francisco.

While some mass shooters, including one of the two who attacked students in May at the STEM School Highlands Ranch in the Denver area, have been female, it is true that the overwhelming majority are male.

"If there was anything more obvious, I don't know what is," Newsom continued. "I think that goes deep to the issue of how we raise our boys to be men, goes deeply to values that we tend to hold dear — power, dominance, aggression, over empathy, care and collaboration."

He also said, "I want to just introduce that into this debate as we move more tactically to address the issue of early childhood trauma, address the issues of stresses that become mental health issues, that become access to weapons. All of those things."

Newsom also said that he wanted to make it more difficult for people to purchase a gun in the state if they were determined to pose a threat to others.

What else?

In June, California passed a law mandating that everyone who purchases ammunition in the state pass a background check first. These checks would cost $1, and could be completed at the store during purchase. There would be no waiting period or delay.

The state already had some of the strictest gun control laws in the nation, and Newsom has been an advocate of increasing gun control measures throughout the country.