The country has witnessed 11 mass shootings this July alone so far
A man wearing a bulletproof vest and carrying an AR-style rifle went on a shooting spree in Philadelphia on Monday, killing five people and injuring two children aged 2 and 13.
The suspect was apprehended with a handgun, a police scanner and ammunition.
The same night, another incident took place at a street festival in Fort Worth, killing three individuals and wounding eight others.
These are among the 11 shootings the country has seen just this month.
According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been 346 mass shootings so far this year through the July 4 weekend, a rate of at least one every day, outpacing the rates of mass shootings at similar points in the calendar in previous years.
Even before this weekend, the nation had already seen more mass killings and victims at this point in the year than any other year since at least 2006.
These deadly incidents underscore the country’s failure to combat the gun violence epidemic as officials loosen gun laws.
In the spate of Independence Day weekend killings, President Joe Biden issued a fresh appeal for a ban on assault weapons.