Steve Kerr Pleads for Gun Control in Passionate Speech After Uvalde Tragedy

Steve Kerr, the head coach of the Golden State Warriors, called for more gun control and criticized the U.S. senators for holding Americans hostage.

Kerr spoke ahead of Tuesday's Western Conference Finals game against the Dallas Mavericks and grew quite emotional during comments that lasted for nearly three minutes.

I am not going to talk about basketball. He said nothing had happened with the team in the last six hours. Any basketball questions are unimportant. Fourteen children were killed 400 miles from here when we left shootaround. And a teacher. In the last 10 days we have had elderly Black people killed in a supermarket. There have been Asian churchgoers killed in Southern California. There are children murdered at school. When will we do something? I am so tired of getting up here and offering my sympathies to the families that are out there. I am tired of the moments of silence. Enough.

There are 50 senators who refuse to vote on H.R.8 because it is a background check rule that the House passed a couple years ago. It has been sitting there for two years. There is a reason they won't vote on it. To hold on to power. I want to know if all of the senators will do anything about the violence and school shootings. Are you going to put your own desire for power ahead of the lives of our children, elderly, and churchgoers? That is what it looks like. We do it every week. I am fed up. I have had enough. We are going to play the game tonight, but I want every person here, every person listening to this, to think about their own child or grandchild or mother or father or sister, brother. How would you feel if this happened to you? We cannot get numb to this.

We have to have a moment of silence and not read about it. Go Dubs. Let's go, Mavs, that's what we're going to do. We are going to play a basketball game. 50 senators in Washington are going to hold us hostage. Do you know that 90 percent of Americans want universal background checks? Ninety percent of us! We are being held hostage by 50 senators in Washington who refuse to vote despite what the American people want. They will not vote on it because they want to retain their power. It is pathetic. I have had enough.

According to the Texas Department of Public Safety, 18 students and one teacher were killed. The 18-year-old was dead.

There was a shooting in a predominantly Black neighborhood of Buffalo, New York earlier this month. CNN reported that 10 people were killed and three were injured at a Tops Friendly Markets store.

Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said it was a hate crime.

One person died and five were wounded in a shooting at a church in California earlier this month.

Kerr was not the only high-profile figure in the NBA who called for change after another mass shooting in the United States. The Los Angeles Lakers star has a personal connection to education, as he helped start the I PROMISE School in Ohio.

LeBron James @KingJames

My thoughts and prayers goes out to the families of love ones loss & injured at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, TX! Like when is enough enough man!!! These are kids and we keep putting them in harms way at school. Like seriously "AT SCHOOL" where it's suppose to be the safest!

LeBron James @KingJames

There simply has to be change! HAS TO BE!! 😔😔😔😔🥺🥺🥺🥺.. Praying to the heavens above to all with kids these days in schools. 🙏🏾🙏🏾🙏🏾

As a coach, Kidd said, we have kids, people in this room have kids. You can think about what could happen with your family or friends at school. The news of what is happening throughout the country is sad.

Kerr supports stronger gun control measures. The Warriors head coach's father was killed when he was in college.