Profiles in courage are hard to come by these days. If “Profiles in Courage” author and former President John Kennedy, from the day of the Sandy Hook Elementary School slaughter a decade ago to now, examined courage in relation to safe firearms/gun control legislation he’d be hard-pressed to find any.

The Washington Post recently ran an article on senators who could have done something to stop, or at least slow, the gun carnage a decade ago, but did not. Two of these senators are from Colorado: Michael Bennet (current) and Mark Udall (former). U.S. Sen. Bennet has finally changed his position on banning semi-automatic weapons after 10 years and numerous conversations with a mother of a victim of the Aurora theater shooting. He regrets his decade-ago decision to vote against a ban. But as so often with regrets that one probably knew were regrettable at the time, is it too late to say sorry? Is it better late than never?

To refresh memory, the murders at Sandy Hook Elementary resulted in the violent deaths by Bushmaster of 20 young children and six adults who tried to save the children. Since that time, according to numerous news reports, the United States has experienced more than 4,200 mass shootings and 189 school shootings involving at least one death and 54 involving multiple deaths. The Uvalde, Texas school murderer slayed 19 children and two teachers in 2022 using an AR-style rifle with 375 rounds of 5.56-caliber ammunition the shooter bought right after his 18th birthday and just days before the attack.

According to K-12 Dive, 227 people died in school shootings of various sorts in 2023 with five involving the deaths of four or more victims including six deaths at The Covenant School in Nashville. The Covenant shooter used an AR-15 style rifle and a handgun. The handgun does less damage than the AR-15 that creates a “blast effect” on internal organs. A handgun makes a hole when traveling through a lung; an AR-15 obliterates the lung.

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Certainly, Sens. Bennet and Udall were familiar with semi-automatic weapon damage in 2013. The Sandy Hook shooter used 30 rounds in q0 magazines each from his Bushmaster XM-15-E2S. Sandy Hook parents of deceased victims visited the senators to request their support for a ban on these types of weapons, according to The Washington Post. The senators declined support and the bill died by filibuster. Udall, in a tough re-election race he lost, hoped the NRA wouldn’t go after him, but it did anyway.

In 2020, Colorado revealed its true “blueness” in a Democratic blow-out of the GOP in state and national elections. Bennet signed on to sponsor his GOSAFE ammunition limitation legislation in 2021. He stated at the time in his press release: “For more than two decades, Colorado has had to grieve over one incident of senseless gun violence after another. Gun violence has become normal in this country, and it has shaped the ways our kids are growing up.” Apparently, he hadn’t come to that conclusion after Sandy Hook. He won re-election in 2022 by 15 points. His principal issue was courageously supporting abortion rights in our state where abortion rights are solid. Better safe than sorry.

Bennet’s Second Amendment positions aren’t his only legislative subjects that undermine or ignore the common weal. Bennet was well-known as superintendent of Denver Public Schools before his appointment to the august U.S. Senate. He was the business guy who would “turn around” Denver’s schools. He introduced its current charter school and choice “portfolio” school-management system.

His pro-charter, pro-school-choice platform essentially eliminated neighborhood boundaries as a means of organizing public schools from elementary to high school. This decision has resulted in a segregated charter school system in which charter organizations such as KIPP, University Prep, Rocky Mountain Prep and some DSST schools target Hispanic and Black children to form schools with 90%-plus minority students on the marketing line that these schools are the best. Unfortunately, that marketing line hasn’t panned out if standardized test results are the measure of academic achievement.

To further his imprimatur to this model of anti-integration, Bennet has introduced federal legislation, S.1480, the “Equitable Access to School Facilities Act.” The goal of the bill is to increase charter school funding by providing public dollars and financing of charter school buildings as well as free access to public buildings.

In Los Angeles, where this model is already in place, traditional public school children are squished in buildings to make room for charter school kids. Two different schools in the same building compete for play-yard time, cafeteria space, auditorium use and library services. It’s easy to picture the problems.

The legislation conforms to desires of Silicon Valley and venture capital billionaires who are pouring millions into school board elections to fund candidates who will turn publicly funded schools into privately managed charter school systems.

Who gets richer when charter schools are built with public money? Bond underwriters and wealthy investors who want to reduce their tax bills.

Who benefits when charter schools gain free access to publicly funded neighborhood school buildings? Private management enterprises that love free real estate.

Charter schools are non-profits in Colorado, but the management companies that administer the schools make plenty of profit off the public dime. Meanwhile, unelected charter school boards often have members who may also benefit financially from school management contracts. Bennet’s legislation serves these interests.

It shouldn’t take an act of courage to commit to public schools as public schools. It shouldn’t take an act of courage to know re-segregation of publicly financed schools is not healthy for civil society. Will Bennet need another decade to courageously come to that conclusion?

Paula Noonan owns Colorado Capitol Watch, the state’s premier legislature tracking platform.