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Renewing his call for stricter gun laws on the third anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, used a tense federal hearing in Sacramento on Monday to advocate for broader background checks and disarming people on a federal no-fly list.

“Rather than take a position of ‘we’ll pass no laws,’ I think it’s time folks took a stand” for tighter gun laws, Thompson said at the outset of a hearing at the Capitol. “If you’re a criminal or you’re dangerously mentally ill,” he added, “I don’t think you should have a gun.”

On the third anniversary of the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School, some gun industry and law enforcement leaders called Monday for the federal government to close a loophole that allows thousands of people to buy firearms each year without background checks.

Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA) says that although he is a gun owner himself and strongly believes in the Second Amendment, he also believes people on the no-fly list should be barred from purchasing guns.

“I’m a gun owner. I strongly believe in the Second Amendment,” Thompson said during an emotional press conference on Capitol Hill Thursday held by House and Senate Democrats to commemorate the third anniversary of the Newtown, Conn. shootings.

Some people shouldn’t have guns. Terrorists are at the top of that list.

However, a loophole in federal law allows those on the FBI’s terrorist watch list to walk into a gun store, pass a background check and leave with weapons.

The lawmaker who represents the district where a deadly shooting at an elementary school took place three years ago pointedly stood in silence on the House floor Wednesday.

Rep. Elizabeth Esty (D-Conn.), whose district includes Newtown, noted the coming Dec. 14 anniversary of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School that killed 20 children. She lamented the repeated moments of silence on the House floor for mass shootings instead of legislative responses.

U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson (CA-5) announced Monday a $1,975,339 Emergency Relief grant for the repair or reconstruction of federal-aid highways and roads on federal lands that have suffered serious damage as a result of the Valley fire.

The funds come from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration.

WASHINGTON — House Democrats are trying another tactic to force a vote to ban suspected terrorists from buying guns, and the House GOP leadership is already knocking the effort.

California Rep. Mike Thompson, the head of the House Democrats’ gun violence task force, filed a “discharge petition” that would automatically force a vote to keep people on the no-fly list from buying guns. If a majority of House members sign on, it forces an automatic vote on the bill — even if GOP leaders oppose it.

Doctors’ groups joined Democrats on Wednesday in calling on the US Congress to lift the ban on the use of federal funds for gun violence research.

A collection of physicians’ groups delivered a petition to the US Capitol signed by more than 2,000 doctors across America seeking a reversal of a 20-year ban that prohibits the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to conduct research on gun violence.