Most Republicans in Congress have never cast a single vote for a gun safety law, so when they vote no there's nothing to explain. Carlos Gimenez is a harder case, because he did vote yes once — and he was proud of it, and he put out a press release saying so.
Then 19 children and two teachers were murdered at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, and he voted against every single thing the House tried to do about it.
March 2021: one of eight
On March 11, 2021, the House passed the Bipartisan Background Checks Act, which would have required a background check on essentially every gun sale, including private ones. It passed 227 to 203.
Exactly eight House Republicans voted yes. Gimenez was one of them. So were two of his fellow Florida Republicans, Vern Buchanan and Maria Elvira Salazar.
He didn't hide it. That same day his office put out a statement explaining the vote in his own words:
"As a responsible gun owner, I know firsthand the importance of upholding the 2nd amendment. That is why I support measures that safeguard transfers between close family members and short-term gun loans among hunters and sport shooters.
"Today, I voted for the Bipartisan Background Checks Act to close a loophole exploited by dangerous criminals to side-step the system and illegally obtain firearms. This simple fix helps promote safe, sensible, and responsible gun ownership."
A "simple fix." "Safe, sensible, and responsible."
Everytown for Gun Safety put out a release thanking him. The people quoted in it were Maria José and Fred Wright of Florida — lifelong Republicans whose son Jerry was murdered at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in 2016.
"We are very grateful to Rep. Gimenez for voting for H.R. 8 and showing he prioritizes the safety of his constituents."
May 2022: Uvalde
On May 24, 2022, a gunman walked into Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, and killed 19 children and two teachers.
The House responded by putting bill after bill on the floor. Here is how the congressman who called background checks a "simple fix" voted on each one.
The Protecting Our Kids Act — raised the minimum age to buy a semiautomatic rifle from 18 to 21, banned high-capacity magazines, and required safe storage. Passed the House 223 to 204 on June 8, 2022.
Gimenez: No.
The Federal Extreme Risk Protection Order Act — a federal red flag law, letting a court temporarily take guns from someone found to be a danger to themselves or others. Passed the House on June 9, 2022. Only five Republicans voted yes.
Gimenez: No.
The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act — the one that actually became law. It toughened background checks for buyers under 21, closed the "boyfriend loophole" that let convicted domestic abusers keep their guns, and funded state red flag laws. It cleared the House 234 to 193 on June 24, 2022, with 14 Republicans voting yes.
Gimenez: No.
The Assault Weapons Ban — passed the House 217 to 213 on July 29, 2022.
Gimenez: No.
Four bills. Four no votes — including a no on the narrowest one of the four, the bipartisan compromise that fourteen of his fellow House Republicans supported and that became federal law.
Look at what that means side by side. The bill Gimenez voted yes on in 2021 was broader than the one he voted no on in 2022. Universal background checks on every sale is a much bigger step than tightening checks for buyers under 21. He was for the big version before Uvalde and against the small version after it.
And then he went further
The next year he didn't just decline to add gun laws — he voted to take one away.
On June 13, 2023, the House voted to overturn the ATF's rule regulating pistols fitted with "stabilizing braces," an attachment that lets a handgun be shouldered and fired like a short rifle. It was a straight party-line rollback: 217 Republicans voted for it and only two voted against.
Gimenez voted yes.
What he has never done is explain it
There is no press release on his site walking through why the "simple fix" stopped being simple. No statement reconciling March 2021 with June 2022. He put out a release when the vote was easy to defend and said nothing at all when it wasn't.
What did happen in between is worth knowing. On May 10, 2022 — two weeks before Uvalde, and about six weeks before the House votes — a pro-Trump group called the America First Political Committee named Gimenez its "top target for removal from Congress" in that August's Republican primary. Its list of grievances against him ran to his cooperation with the January 6 investigation and his other breaks with the party.
He was, in other words, being publicly hunted as a RINO in a primary that was ten weeks away at the exact moment those four bills hit the floor.
What it costs Florida
Florida loses about 3,300 people to gun violence every year — roughly nine every day. This is the state of Pulse and Parkland. The parents Everytown put in front of a microphone to thank Gimenez in 2021 were Florida Republicans burying a son murdered in a nightclub in their own state.
He is also not the only Florida Republican who said the right thing about guns once and then couldn't be found when the votes came. Brian Mast — who carried an M4 in the Army, lost both legs to a roadside bomb in Afghanistan, and personally knew one of the 17 people murdered at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School — publicly asked for a pause on AR-15 sales after Parkland, then voted against every one of these same bills and scrubbed the whole episode off his campaign website. In Ohio, Mike Turner promised a magazine limit two days after nine people were shot dead in his own district, then voted to strip one out of a bill.
The pattern is always the same. The promise comes when the country is watching. The vote comes months later, when it isn't.
Sources
- Roll call 75, March 11, 2021 — Bipartisan Background Checks Act, Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives
- Gimenez Statement on Background Check Legislation, March 11, 2021 (archived)
- Everytown Applauds Rep. Gimenez for Voting for Legislation to Require Background Checks on all Gun Sales, March 16, 2021
- House clears bipartisan gun violence reduction measure — Roll Call, June 24, 2022
