Junior Sen. Chris Murphy said the day he detoured from a trip with his kids to counsel Sandy Hook parents who had lost theirs forever changed his life — personally, politically and religiously.
In an Off Message Podcast interview with Politico's Glenn Thrush, Murphy said that December day in 2012 changed everything for him.
"I walked out of that tragedy feeling like I had just been handed my mission in public service, that if I wasn't able, in my career in the Senate, to do something meaningful to pay homage to those kids and those teachers, then I had failed," Murphy told Thrush.
And Murphy, who served in the House for six years before his 2013 election as a senator, believes gun control is a pivotal issue for Democrats, now more than ever.
"This has become a litmus test issue for leadership in the Democratic Party," Murphy told Thrush. "I mean, if you want to be a leader in the Democratic Party, I think this presidential election has proven that you have to be right on the issue of guns."
Murphy, who held a 15-hour filibuster back in June over gun control legislation, said he was on his way to New York City on Dec. 14 with his kids to see the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree when he got word of the tragedy that was unfolding in Newtown.
"There are a lot of days that, frankly, wish I wasn't there and wish that I hadn't seen and heard the things that I did. I think maybe the only upside of it is that it makes me more personally and psychologically invested in this cause than had I not been standing with the parents as they were receiving that just God-awful news," Murphy said.
Though he said he struggles with religion, Murphy said he came out of that day with more of it.
"It's hard to believe that there's a God in this world who would allow that to happen, so there's a big part of living through Sandy Hook that makes you question the kind of faith that people practice. But, at the same time, there were a number of those stories that suggest that there's some higher power out there that you have to at least consider," Murphy said.
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