For Rep. Debbie Dingell, the gun control debate hits close to home

House Democrats’ 25-hour sit-in to demand a vote on gun control legislation had plenty of viral highlights.

There was the heated shouting match between Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Calif., and other Democrats; Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., leading the House Democrats in a moving rendition of “We Shall Overcome,” and Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s heroic doughnut delivery, to name a few.

But one of the protest’s most moving moments came shortly after midnight, from Michigan Democrat Debbie Dingell.

Several House members at the sit-in demonstrated by holding up signs bearing the names of victims of mass shootings in the U.S., including the recent massacre in Orlando. But Dingell chose to focus on the far less publicized impact of gun violence on the victims and survivors of domestic abuse — a community that includes Dingell herself.

“I lived in a house with a man that should not have had a gun,” Dingell said. “I know what it’s like to see a gun pointed at you and wonder if you are going to live. And I know what it’s like to hide in a closet and pray to God, ‘Do not let anything happen to me.’ And we don’t talk about it, we don’t want to say that it happens in all kinds of households, and we still live in a society where we will let a convicted felon who was stalking somebody, of domestic abuse, still own a gun.”

It was one of a handful of times Dingell had spoken publicly about growing up with an abusive father and the time he pulled a gun on her mother — and then her. The first time she spoke out on this painful part of her past was December 2012, in a Washington Post op-ed following the mass murder of 20 young children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

“I’m still not the best at talking about it,” Dingell told Yahoo News over the phone Thursday morning. “There have been several different moments in my life where I’ve gotten the courage to speak about it more.”

Dingell said she spent the day Wednesday debating whether or not to speak out. When she finally agreed, she said, “I didn’t know what I was going to say before I went up there.”

But the words flowed right out.

Not only does Dingell know first hand what it’s like to live in fear with someone who perhaps should not have had access to a gun but, as she also noted in her speech, she knows what it’s like to live with a responsible gun owner and staunch defender of the Second Amendment.

Dingell’s husband, former Democratic Rep. John Dingell, is a hunter and outspoken gun rights proponent. He previously served for years on the National Rifle Association’s board of directors and, before his retirement from Congress in 2015, received an A+ rating from the NRA for his pro-gun voting record.

“John understands how fragile our civil liberties are and the importance of the Second Amendment,” she said. “He fought a war, he’s had to use a gun to defend himself and his home.”

“I understand that,” she continued, “ and I don’t want to take his guns away. I don’t want to take anyone’s guns away. But I also don’t want a suspected terrorist or a convicted felon, a domestic abuser to have a gun.”

Shortly after taking office last January, Dingell co-sponsored a bill to prevent known abusers from having access to guns.

Slideshow: Democrats stage gun-control House sit-in >>>

It’s this dichotomy within her own 35-year marriage, Dingell said, that has given her unique insight not only into the gun control issue, but the divisions within the House of the Representatives that resulted in the current sit-in.

“I think I understand the tension on the floor probably better than anybody because I live that tension every day of my life,” she told Yahoo News.

Dingell did not consult with her husband before delivering her impassioned speech late Wednesday night — though she did get in touch with the person staying with him to ask that he be kept from watching TV.

When they finally spoke on the phone Thursday morning, Dingell said she got her husband up-to-speed on the sit-in and warned him that her comments would likely be on the news. “He asked, ‘What news?,’ and I said, ‘Everything.’”

Though also a Democrat, Dingell said she’s certain that if her husband were still in office, “He would not have been a member that would have participated in the sit-in.”

Still, she said, “He was proud of what I did. He knows that I spoke from my heart and how tough this stuff is, and he wants me to be an effective leader.”

Plus, she added, he knows “that I’m not him.”

More than 24 hours after Dingell and her fellow Democrats made themselves comfortable on the House floor, the sit-in came to a close. But before the protesting lawmakers began dispersing from Capitol Hill, vowing to resume their call for a gun control vote after the House’s July 4th break, Dingell commended her colleagues for their commitment to changing the conversation.

“This has brought us together as a caucus, I’ve never seen the caucus this united,” she said. “Until we talk about the real issues and we don’t use talking points, nothing’s going to change. It’s not going to happen.”