Steve Kerr addresses a mass shooting in Sacramento ahead of Warriors-Kings.

For quite a while, Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr has been known for his willingness to discuss topics beyond just sports, and he’s been particularly known for speaking out against gun violence. (His father, Malcolm Kerr, the president of the American University of Beirut, was assassinated by gunmen in 1984.) Gun violence hit close to Kerr’s Warriors again Sunday with an early-morning mass shooting in Sacramento not far from the Golden 1 Center, where the Warriors are facing the Kings Sunday night. And Kerr spent his pre-game media availability discussing that shooting, which left six people dead and at least 12 injured:

Here’s a transcript of everything Kerr says there:

“It’s devastating news. I didn’t know about it until this morning when I woke up. First and foremost, I’m just thinking about the city of Sacramento and all the families who are affected, the victims, the survivors, the people who are injured. Just so many lives devastated. And, so, everybody with the Warriors, we all share in your city’s grief. There’s not a whole lot you can do or say, but we’re all crushed today as we try to prepare for this game.”

“It’s just devastating news, and I know we’ll have a moment of silence before the game. And I’ll be honest, I think it’s the right thing to do to have a moment of silence, but it’s probably the ninth or 10th moment of silence that I will have experienced as coach of the Warriors, when we mourn losses of people who have died in mass shootings. So I don’t think that moments of silence are going to do anything. At some point, our government has to decide, are we going to have some common-sense gun laws? It’s not going to solve everything, but it will save lives.”

“Several years ago, the House passed a background check law, HR 8, sponsored by Mike Thompson [D-California], here in Napa. It passed the House with bipartisan support, never made it to the light of day in the Senate, despite the fact that 80 to 90 percent of Americans support background checks. And you think of all the common-sense laws we could and should put in place, if we had any guts, if our government had any guts, if people put others in front of their own career paths and their own reelection campaigns and their own propaganda to manipulate people. It’s right there in front of us.”

“This happens in churches, it happens in schools, it happens right there in front of us right in downtown Sacramento. A couple of years ago, a madman sat in a hotel room in Las Vegas and opened up with semiautomatic fire on people at a concert. Did we do anything about it? The House tried to, and the Senate refused to even look at it. So at some point, I would hope that we would think about our fellow citizens and do something about it instead of play politics.”

“We have more regulations for driving a car than we do for carrying a weapon. It’s no problem to just go and buy a semiautomatic rifle. And yet, if you want to drive a car, what do you have to do? You’ve got to apply for a license, you’ve got to get a license, you’ve got to go through training. It’s just the same stuff, over and over and over again.”

“So, it’s devastating, and I’m so, so, sorry for the victims and their families. MY family has gone through the same thing, and we know how devastating and life-changing it is. Everything changes here for all the victims’ families. And it’s just time, it’s time for us to do something about it instead of have another moment of silence, instead of send thoughts and prayers.”

After answering a question about if the Warriors had been warned of any safety concerns ahead of the game in the wake of the shooting (Kerr said their security team told them there weren’t particular concerns), Kerr closed that press availability with “I don’t think it’s appropriate to talk basketball at this point. So I think maybe we’ll just connect post-game. Thank you.”

[Dalton Johnson on Twitter]

About Andrew Bucholtz

Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.