NEW YORK CITY, NY — In the wake of a member of the Cuomo administration being critically injured when a random bullet struck him in the head, Gov. Andrew Cuomo took to the airwaves to plead for national gun control legislation to stem the tide of gun violence across the country.

On the CNN program “New Day,” Cuomo said, “How many incidents do we have to have, how many weeks do we have to have with the same story over and over and over about the insanity that this country is allowing to continue with violence and loss of life of innocent people, because we have people who have no business having guns, having guns.”

The incident he referred to occurred in the pre-dawn hours of September 7 in Brooklyn, as Carey Gabay, 43, who is a lawyer with the Empire State Development Corporation, was with his brother and friends in Flatbush in advance of the West Indian Day parade.

Officials from the New York State Police Department said Gabay was apparently an unintended victim who was caught in the crossfire of two suspected gangs. Eight to 10 shots were fired in the exchange between the two groups. Cuomo said the lawyer remained in “very critical” condition.

The previous day, Cuomo addressed a gathering of reporters and made essentially the same points. “We can protect the Second Amendment and legitimate gun owners, but we also need to protect people,” Cuomo said. “How many mentally ill people have to get a gun and kill children? How many criminals have to get a gun and kill innocent people before this nation is going to say we have to do something?”

In the wake of the Sandy Hook massacre of school children in December 2012, Cuomo pushed through the NY SAFE Act, which addressed semi-automatic weapons and the size of magazines. Upstate communities railed against the act, saying that Cuomo and the legislature were violating their Second Amendment rights to bear arms.

The Sullivan County Legislature and many upstate municipalities passed resolutions opposing the act, and most memorably, Town of Delaware Councilperson Al Steppich addressed the county legislature on February 21, 2013 and said that his town had passed a resolution against the act, but that it did not go far enough. He said, “We should hold the governor and the legislators in contempt of the Constitution, and try [them] for treason.”

The gun-control measure that is most widely supported by the public is universal background checks of gun purchasers, which would provide for background checks for private purchases of firearms including those sold online and at gun shows.

Repeated polls show that about 90% of U.S. citizens support such legislation, but it has been blocked by opponents at the federal level.