Giffords finds strength, direction in Judaism

Invoking a commitment to public service as an example of tikkun olam, or “repairing the world,” former astronaut and U.S. Navy Capt. Mark Kelly told a large, captivated audience at USC about the journey he and his wife, retired U.S. Rep. Gabrielle “Gabby” Giffords (D-Ariz.), have been on since a 2011 assassination attempt on Giffords thrust them into the center of the gun-control movement.  

And Giffords, who has limited speaking ability, used the few words she offered to encourage the crowd: “I’m still fighting to make the world a better place, and you can, too. Get involved with your community. Be a leader, set an example. Be passionate, be courageous, be your best.”

Prior to representing Arizona’s 8th Congressional District, Giffords, who is Jewish through her father’s Lithuanian heritage, helmed her family’s automotive business and served in the state legislature. A moderate Democrat, Giffords pushed Congress to provide further protection for her state’s southern border and was a vocal supporter of the Affordable Care Act. 

Although Giffords spoke briefly on March 8 at the 14th annual Carmen and Louis Warschaw Distinguished Lecture Series, organized by The Casden Institute for the Study of the Jewish Role in American Life at USC, she left most of the talking to her husband, Kelly, who is Catholic. A naval pilot during Operation Desert Storm who later joined NASA as a Space Shuttle pilot, he participated in and commanded numerous missions on Space Shuttles Endeavour and Discovery. 

“When Gabby entered Congress in 2007, I thought I had the risky job,” Kelly said during his remarks. “I had flown 39 combat missions. I had flown two flights into space already by that point in my career. But as it turned out, Gabby was the one who would nearly lose her life serving her country. And what happened that day would certainly become the biggest challenge — for both of us, I think, personal challenge — that we would ever face.”

During a public event at an Arizona supermarket in January 2011, Jared Loughner approached Giffords and shot her in the left side of her forehead with a 9 mm pistol, before opening fire on the attending crowd — ultimately killing six people and injuring 12 others. Giffords was left partially paralyzed, and with limited speaking ability. 

In a speech full of stories and personal parables on faith, fate and patience, Kelly recalled the two shocking phone calls he had with one of his wife’s aides in the moments after the shooting. Kelly and his daughters immediately flew to Arizona from Texas, where he had been training for a mission. 

Just three months after being shot in the head, Giffords traveled to Florida to watch Kelly take off on a mission to the International Space Station. Although Kelly had initially backed out of the mission after the shooting, his family encouraged him to go. It was his last trip to space, and the last for the Space Shuttle Endeavor.  

“My wife, Gabby, could not be there for the landing. She was there for the liftoff, but while I was in space she had to have her final brain surgery, and that was to replace the piece of skull — which is about the size of my hand — with a prosthetic,” Kelly said. 

“And if any of you guys were to come to our house in Tucson, one of the first things Gabby may do if you haven’t been there before is take you over to the freezer and pull out the blue Tupperware where she keeps the real skull. It’s pretty incredible,” he added. “But it shows you Gabby’s attitude about this, and the fact when bad things happen to good people, you can get past them. And it was Gabby’s strength that she drew from her Jewish values that allowed her to do this.”

In August 2011, Giffords returned to Congress for the first time to vote to raise the federal debt ceiling. Still feeble, she received a standing ovation from her colleagues. Giffords officially resigned from Congress in January 2012 to focus on her recovery. 

Just over a year later, as the country reeled from the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, Giffords and Kelly founded Americans for Responsible Solutions, a nonprofit and super PAC. It advocates for gun reforms, such as requiring background checks at gun shows and making it easier for law enforcement to go after gun traffickers. However, both Giffords and Kelly remain strong supporters of the Second Amendment, and they are both gun owners, Kelly said. 

In April 2013, their organization helped bring a bipartisan bill to expand background checks to a vote in the Senate. It failed by six votes. A few days prior to speaking at USC, Giffords and Kelly returned to Congress to introduce a similar measure in the House, where they hope it will have a better chance of passing. 

Part of the problem, Kelly admitted in an interview with the Journal prior to his speech, is that members of both parties worry they may be targeted by gun rights advocates in their next election if they were to support such a measure. One of Americans for Responsible Solutions’ goals, Kelly said, “is to convince members of Congress that they can vote for this stuff and not lose their next election. The power of the gun lobby, while it’s significant, it’s not insurmountable.”

This work, Kelly said, gives purpose to the horrific events his family has experienced. 

“Before all of this happened to us, while Gabby and I are people of faith, especially Gabby with her Jewish faith, I wasn’t a big believer in fate. I just thought the world spins, and the clock ticks, and things did not happen for any particular reason,” Kelly said. Now, he added, he feels something like providence in events. 

Of course, gun reform is just one of the things that Giffords is working on at the moment. She’s focused on trying to repair herself as well.

“I’m working on lots of therapy — speech therapy, physical therapy and yoga, too,” she told the crowd. “But my spirit is as strong as ever.”