By DOUGLAS HELLER June 22, 2016

WASHINGTON – Mere days after voting down legislation that would have prevented individuals on the terror watch list from purchasing firearms – and fewer than twenty-four hours after all getting shot in their dicks – GOP leaders Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio and Rand Paul met with reporters today to discuss their vote on further proposed legislation this morning.

On the afternoon of Tuesday, June 21st, McConnell, Rubio and Paul were all shot directly in their dicks by a shooter armed with an AR 15 rifle. The FBI confirmed that the shooter had been on the terror watch list but had been able to purchase the gun legally, a mere three days prior.

Mitch McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader, limping in obvious discomfort and wearing a diaper of bandages to cover the grisly wound where his dick used to be, addressed the press in the wake of his dick-shooting, explaining why he and his associates chose to vote down gun control legislation earlier today. “Yes, it’s true that I was shot directly in the dick yesterday by a terror watch list suspect who had purchased his gun legally,” said McConnell, in obvious pain. “However, we need to think first and foremost of the constitutional rights of people on the terror watch list to own firearms, instead of using this as an opportunity to push a partisan agenda.”

McConnell, whimpering like a tiny child, continued, “Yes, my dick was shot clean off, drawing attention to what many would consider an avoidable symptom of public policy that my party has willfully allowed to fester – fester much like the gory crater between my legs where my dick used to be – but we need to approach this serious topic in a serious way, and not do things like pass regulations that would disallow people the opportunity to shoot the dicks off of elected representatives.”

Rand Paul, the Republican Senator from Kentucky who had his dick shot off, followed up McConnell’s statements by adding, “The man who shot all of us in the dick yesterday might have been on the terror watch list at one point, but the FBI had removed him before he purchased his constitutionally-guaranteed AR 15.” Paul, who approached the podium with the aid of a walker and who was dressed similarly to McConnell – in a sopping diaper made of gauze and bandages – went on to point out that there were no laws that the United States legislature could pass to prevent such a callous dick-shooting. “Yes, our dicks were shot off, but our dicks are certainly a small price to pay when the grim specter of possibly implementing expanded background checks or extended waiting periods or closing a number of legal loopholes looms over our constitutional freedoms.”

Paul then relieved himself by urinating into a plastic bag strapped to his naked thigh – since he no longer has a dick – and ceded the microphone to Marco Rubio, Junior Republican Senator from Florida.

“While nothing will ever erase the image of my own dick separating from my body and sailing across the floor of that mall food court – my seminal vesicles unfurling like a cast fishing line in an unbelievably-painful display – the thought of expanding background checks that would place too many burdens on law-abiding Americans makes me physically sick.” Rubio clarified, “Burdens like having to wait more than a few days to purchase a gun or to submit their potentially violent past to some sort of official scrutiny in case they use their constitutionally-guaranteed firearm to do something like shoot the dick off of a Senator from Florida.”

Rubio, the bullet-riddled gnarl that was once his dick causing him considerable pain, feebly wiped tears from his face before being led from the stage by a nurse who will accompany him for the next five to eight months as he learns how to navigate life without a dick.

When reached for comment, Executive Vice President of the National Rifle Association Wayne LaPierre declined to speak to reporters. An NRA staffer relayed that LaPierre had expressed astonishment upon hearing of the shooting, and commended the shooter on having such impressive acumen as to actually hit, “three such minuscule dicks.”