The expanded background check bill that failed in the Senate would not have done anything to prevent the mass shootings in Newtown, Aurora or Tucson–but that didn’t stop the daughter of a Sandy Hook Elementary victim from confronting Sen. Kelly Ayotte about her vote against the bill during a town hall meeting on Tuesday.

The tense exchange between Ayotte and Erica Lafferty, the daughter of Sandy Hook Elementary School principal Dawn Hochsprung, started when Lafferty referenced the meeting she had with the the senator after the vote took place. “You had mentioned that day the burden on owners of gun stores that the expanded background checks would cause. I am just wondering why the burden of my mother being gunned down in the hall of her elementary school isn’t more important that that.”

Ayotte expressed her sympathy but also made clear that mental health needs to be the primary focus of future efforts because a flawed ‘background check system’ wasn’t the reason Adam Lanza killed 26 people that day.

Despite Ayotte offering to continue talking with her, Lafftery walked out of the room.