Bloomberg: I'm coming after the NRA

A U.S. Park Police helicopter removes a man from the Washington Navy Yard on September 16, 2013. At least 12 people were killed in a shooting rampage, according to Washington Police Chief Cathy Lanier.

Connecticut State Police evacuate children from Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012. Adam Lanza opened fire in the school, killing 20 children and six adults before killing himself. Police say he also shot and killed his mother in her Newtown home.

James Holmes pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to opening fire July 20, 2012, at the Century Aurora 16 theater in Aurora, Colorado, during the midnight premiere of "The Dark Knight Rises." Twelve people were killed and dozens were wounded. Holmes is charged with 142 counts, including first-degree murder. His trial is scheduled to begin in February 2014.

A military jury convicted Army Maj. Nidal Hasan on Friday, August 23, 2013, of 13 counts of premeditated murder in a shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas. During the November 5, 2009 shooting, 13 people died and 32 were injured.

Jiverly Wong shot and killed 13 people at the American Civic Association in Binghamton, New York, before turning the gun on himself on April 3, 2009, police say. Four other people were injured at the immigration center shooting. Wong had been taking English classes at the center.

Pallbearers carry a casket of one of Michael McLendon's 10 victims. McLendon shot and killed his mother in her Kingston, Alabama, home, before shooting his aunt, uncle, grandparents and five more people. He shot and killed himself in Samson, Alabama, on March 10, 2009. McClendon left a note saying he put his mother "out of her misery."

Virginia Tech student Seung-Hui Cho went on a shooting spree on the campus in Blacksburg, Virginia, on April 16, 2007. Cho killed two people at the West Ambler Johnston dormitory and, after chaining the doors closed, killed another 30 at Norris Hall, home to the Engineering Science and Mechanics Department. He wounded 17 people before killing himself. It is the deadliest shooting rampage in U.S. history.

Mark Barton walked into two Atlanta trading firms on July 29, 1999, and fired shots, leaving nine dead and 13 wounded, police say. Hours later police found Barton at a gas station in Acworth, Georgia, where he pulled a gun and killed himself. The day before Barton had bludgeoned his wife and his two children in their Stockbridge, Georgia, apartment, police say. The children's birth mother and grandmother had been murdered six years earlier in Alabama. Barton was questioned but never charged in that crime.

Eric Harris, left, and Dylan Klebold entered Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, on April 20, 1999, armed with bombs and guns. The students killed 13 and wounded 23 before killing themselves.

George Hennard crashed his pickup through the plate glass window of Luby's Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, on October 16, 1991, before fatally shooting 23 people and committing suicide.

James Huberty shot and killed 21 people, including children, at a McDonald's in San Ysidro, California, on July 18, 1984. A police sharpshooter killed Huberty an hour after the rampage began.

Prison guard George Banks is led through the Luzerne County courthouse in 1985. Banks killed 13 people, including five of his children, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on September 25, 1982. He was sentenced to death in 1993 and received a stay of execution in 2004. His death sentence was overturned in 2010.

Officers carry victims across the University of Texas at Austin campus after Charles Joseph Whitman opened fire from the school's tower, killing 16 people and wounding 30. Police officers shot and killed Whitman, who had killed his mother and wife earlier in the day.

Howard Unruh, a World War II veteran, shot and killed 13 of his neighbors on September 5, 1949, In Camden, New Jersey. Unruh barricaded himself in his house after the shooting. Police overpowered him the next day. He was ruled criminally insane and committed to a state mental institution.

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• Writers: 90% of Americans, 80% of gun owners want background checks for guns


• Writers: Sensible gun laws fail because of politicians' irrational fear of the NRA


• Writers: Everytown for Gun Safety group will show you can support gun control, win elections


• Michael Bloomberg, Shannon Watts: The gun lobby no longer has the field to itself

Editor's note: Michael Bloomberg is the former mayor of New York City and co-founder of Mayors Against Illegal Guns. Shannon Watts is the founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, which she started after 26 people, 20 of them children, were shot to death at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in December 2012.

(CNN) -- A year ago on Thursday, the U.S. Senate failed to pass a bill that would have helped fix our nation's gun laws by requiring background checks on all purchases of firearms. Ninety percent of all Americans -- and more than 80% of gun owners -- believe that all people should be subject to such checks. And even though the bill won majority support in the Senate -- more than 50 members -- it was not enough to break a filibuster.

But in the year after the massacre at Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012, the grassroots movement to pass common sense gun laws and policies that are consistent with the Second Amendment has made great progress just about everywhere except Washington.

In Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware and New York, local citizens helped lead the successful push for legislation that closed loopholes in background checks laws. In Washington state and Wisconsin, citizens helped pass laws that keep firearms out of the hands of convicted domestic abusers.

In Colorado alone, the new law stopped more than 160 prohibited buyers from getting their hands on a gun, and as Coloradans know too well, it only takes one to devastate a family, a community, a nation. And the law hasn't gotten in the way of law-abiding gun owners, who bought more firearms in 2013 than in any preceding year.

We also gave voice to hundreds of thousands of Americans who persuaded Facebook and Instagram to change their policies so that unlicensed gun sellers cannot use their sites to sell guns without background checks.

Thousands marched in Washington for gun control in January last year after the Sandy Hook school murders.

Moms for Gun Safety ran this ad, questioning why a type of chocolate is banned to protect kids but not assault weapons.

These significant victories were won by a growing, nonpartisan coalition that is refusing to wait for Washington to act. That coalition includes parents, mayors, police chiefs, religious leaders, gun owners and everyday Americans of all political persuasions. Mothers, in particular, have been at the forefront of this fight. They've given testimony at town halls, led "Stroller Jams" at state capitals, hosted quilting bees and delivered petitions to legislatures and companies across the country.

To unify the efforts of this diverse coalition of Americans, we are launching Everytown for Gun Safety in America, a new umbrella organization that will be the largest and best-organized counterweight to the gun lobby that has ever been created. Everytown for Gun Safety will expand on the work of two existing organizations -- Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America -- and take the fight for gun violence prevention policies to every community in the country.

Everytown for Gun Safety will continue pushing for better background check laws in Congress and state houses. But we will also broaden our focus to include other issues that are important to Americans, like safe storage education campaigns to help keep kids from being killed by unlocked or dangerously stored guns. And new laws to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers. And efforts to help reduce the nearly 19,400 suicides that happen every year with guns.

In each area, we will make progress by doing something that no gun group, other than the National Rifle Association, has ever done: inform and mobilize voters. The reason the NRA has political influence -- in addition to its campaign contributions -- is that it has scared elected officials into believing that voters will oppose them unless they follow the NRA's Washington leadership, which has grown increasingly extreme and increasingly out of touch with its own members.

Mental illness and shootings

Inside Politics: $50 mil. to combat NRA

Michael Bloomberg: NRA lost in Virginia

Bloomberg to spend $50 million to challenge NRA on guns

In fact, the NRA's reputation for political strength is wildly blown out of proportion and the election results from three statewide contests in Virginia this past November reflect that reality. Candidates who spoke out in support of common sense gun violence prevention policies were elected as governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general. In the attorney general's race, his campaign manager said that the candidate's support for sensible stances on gun issues was a major factor in his victory.

Nonetheless, the perception of an unbeatable gun lobby still lingers and part of our mission will be showing candidates and elected officials that the vast majority of Americans and gun owners support common sense gun policies that respect the Second Amendment and save lives.

To mobilize voters who are committed to backing candidates that support common sense gun policies, Everytown for Gun Safety is launching a Gun Sense Voter campaign. Before the 2014 midterms, we aim to get at least 1 million Americans to pledge to vote for state and federal candidates based on where they stand on gun safety. We'll keep voters informed by tracking candidates' positions and determining which of them support gun safety and which do not.

Leaders from all walks of life will join us on our board of directors, including one of our nation's most respected military leaders, Adm. Mike Mullen, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; University of Oklahoma president and former Sen. David Boren; and former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge. All of us are united by the belief that accepting the status quo -- 12,000 Americans are murdered with guns every year -- is unconscionable.

There is no doubt that we have a big hill to climb. Well-funded, entrenched special interests are always difficult to defeat. And for years, the gun lobby has largely had the field to itself. No longer.

Everytown for Gun Safety and its growing grassroots network will be gunning for change that both protects our country and respects our Constitution.

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Racism isn't just the GOP

• Ruben Navarrette: Anti-immigration Republicans are spoiling the Grand Old Party


• Navarrette: Some Democrats say race is a reason for failure of immigration reform


• He says racism isn't limited to one party; it never has been in history


• Navarrette: There are anti-Latino elements in Democratic and Republican parties

Editor's note: Ruben Navarrette is a CNN contributor and a nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group. Follow him on Twitter: @rubennavarrette. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.

(CNN) -- There are two groups of Republicans: Those who pander to nativists by encouraging anti-Latino prejudice and exploiting the fear and anxiety that come from changing demographics, and those who tolerate the first group.

Both groups are spoiling the Grand Old Party. And they're making life too easy for Democrats, who -- while never particularly good at addressing the needs and concerns of Latino voters -- have lately excelled in the neglect department. The more Latinos are antagonized by Republicans, the more they get ignored by Democrats.

Ain't that swell? The result for America's largest minority is a political paradox, where the media insists this community has tremendous power while those of us within the community know the opposite is true. We're not getting stronger. We're getting weaker.

Such is the misfortune of today's Latino voter, and it's the goal of Democrats to bring it up. When you don't have much to offer, you cling to what little you have -- even if it's just a bumper sticker slogan: "Vote Democrat. Because we're not as bad as Republicans."

Look at what happened with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Rep. Steve Israel, D-New York, when he made remarks about Republicans and racism on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday.

And recently, Pelosi was asked by reporters if she thought race factors into how Republicans deal with the Obama administration.

Pivoting to a hot topic, Pelosi responded: "I think race has something to do with the fact that they're not bringing up an immigration bill."

Inside Politics: Ukraine, Sebelius, GOP

First, that took chutzpah. This is the same Nancy Pelosi who, when she wielded the gavel from 2007 to 2009, deliberately kept immigration off the congressional agenda. This was no secret. Her top lieutenant at the time, Rep. Rahm Emanuel, who talked openly about his reluctance to engage the issue, went so far as to label immigration the "third rail" of American politics.

Did the Democrats' failure to bring up immigration during the two years they controlled both houses of Congress also have something to do with race?

It seems only fair to ask, given what Pelosi said about the GOP. The real reason Democrats put immigration on the back burner wasn't racial but political. Labor leaders give lip service to backing the idea of giving legal status to the undocumented, but the rank-and-file aren't sold. Democrats are no more eager to divide their party than Republicans are to divide theirs.

Democrats benefit from Republican missteps. If the GOP acts as an obstacle, it saves the Democrats from having to play the villain.

Pelosi is right about race -- or more precisely, ethnicity, since Latinos aren't a race -- having a lot to do with why House Republicans won't bring up an immigration bill.

Since most immigrants to the United States, both legal and illegal, are now Latino, Republicans are afraid that -- whichever way the debate goes -- they'll be painted as "anti-Latino," which will lead to another beating at the ballot box. Besides, if they restart the immigration debate, Republicans can count on someone in their party saying something idiotic or incendiary that will turn off Latinos.

Then along comes Israel. When asked by reporters to comment on what Pelosi had said (notice how helpful the liberal media can be in advancing the narrative that Republicans are hostile to minorities), Israel said, "To a significant extent, the Republican base does have elements that are animated by racism. And that's unfortunate."

Israel has a point. Many Americans approach the immigration debate by succumbing to racism. They have for 250 years, starting when Benjamin Franklin railed against the Germans in the mid-1700s. That's a ready made constituency. In the last 20 years, a faction of the GOP has stepped up to service it. And whereas, a hundred years ago, the political piñata would have been the Irish or the Italians, today it's the Latinos.

Yet, that's only half the story. Here's the rest: Racism isn't limited to one party. It never has been.

Today, you'll find anti-Latino elements of the Democratic Party. Democratic politicians are careful not to say anything ugly. But rank-and-file Democratic voters are more uninhibited with their comments. Travel the country, as I have, and you'll hear the same remarks from Democrats that you hear from Republicans -- about how Latino immigrants are defiant, dangerous or deficient. This is why you see resistance to legalizing the undocumented from normally liberal voters in the South, Midwest and Northeast.

Listen up, Latinos. We don't have political power, and we're suffering through a litany of bad choices. But there's a way to improve our lot, and it has nothing to do with demographics. We have to avoid oversimplifying our predicament by blaming only Republicans for the poisonous mood of the immigration debate. Over the years, leading up to the Obama administration's dubious record of deporting 2 million people in five years, Democrats have done their share of damage.

Are racism and nativism part of the immigration debate? Of course they are. But the antidote to such bigotry isn't tolerance or open-mindedness. It's respect. And there is only one way for Latinos to get it, and that's by staying in play and making both parties compete for our votes.

That's not politics. It's common sense. And oftentimes, one doesn't have anything to do with the other.

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Paul Walker's mother drops custody bid

Paul Walker, a star of the "Fast & Furious" movie franchise, died Saturday, November 30, in a car crash, according to his official Facebook page and verified Twitter account. He was 40.

Walker, left, and Vin Diesel appear in a scene from "Fast & Furious 6." Walker's role as Brian O'Conner in the franchise helped to make the actor a star.

Walker and Jordana Brewster appear in "Fast 5."

Kevin Rankin and Walker appear in "Pawn Shop Chronicles," a film about a missing wedding ring that sets off a wild goose chase.

Walker also had a starring role in the upcoming film "Hours," which is about a father trying to keep his daughter alive after Hurricane Katrina.

The actor was part of a band of thieves in the movie "Takers."

Walker appears in the action film "Into the Blue," which also starred Jessica Alba.

Walker appears in "The Fast and the Furious," the first movie in the franchise.

Walker and Reese Witherspoon in a scene from the film "Pleasantville."

Walker, center, appeared in "Skulls" with Leslie Bibb and Joshua Jackson in 2000.

Walker and Freddie Prinze Jr. co-starred in the popular film "She's All That."

Brooklynn Proulx and Walker appear in the film "The Lazarus Project."

Walker, left, and Barry Pepper were U.S. Marines in the drama "Flags of Our Fathers."

Tyrese Gibson and Walker appear in "2 Fast 2 Furious."

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• Cheryl Walker filed for guardianship of 15-year-old Meadow in March


• She claimed that Meadow's mother had a "drinking problem"


• However, she has now requested that her petition be dismissed


• Paul Walker died in a car crash in November

(CNN) -- Paul Walker's mother has dropped her court bid to take guardianship of the late actor's daughter, a lawyer for Cheryl Ann Walker said Thursday.

Cheryl Walker filed for guardianship of 15-year-old Meadow Walker in March, claiming that Meadow's mother, Rebecca Soteros, has a "drinking problem."

Attorney Steven Bledsoe said Cheryl Walker has filed papers that requested her guardianship petition be dismissed.

The document says Cheryl Walker has told a investigator for the court why she wanted to drop the case but would further explain at a scheduled court date April 30, if necessary.

Meadow Walker, 15, stands to inherit an estimated $16 million from her father's estate.

Walker died in a fiery car crash in Los Angeles during a break in filming "Fast & Furious 7" in November.