According to new data just released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, guns are the number one killer of children in the United States of America. The number one killer. More than car accidents. More than cancer.
Over the last two decades, more school-aged children have died from guns than on-duty police officers and active-duty military combined. Think about that: more kids than on-duty cops killed by guns, more kids than soldiers killed by guns.
We need to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. And if we can’t ban assault weapons, then we should raise the age to purchase them from 18 to 21. Strengthen background checks. Enact safe storage laws and red-flag laws. Repeal the immunity that protects gun manufacturers from liability. Address the mental health crisis deepening the trauma of gun violence and as a consequence of that violence.
These are rational, commonsense measures. And here’s what it all means. It all means this: We should reinstate the assault weapons ban and high-capacity magazines that we passed in 1994 with bipartisan support in Congress and the support of law enforcement. Nine categories of semi-automatic weapons were included in that ban, like AK-47s and AR-15s.
And in the 10 years it was law, mass shootings went down. But after Republicans let the law expire in 2004 and those weapons were allowed to be sold again, mass shootings tripled. Those are the facts.
There have always been limitations on what weapons you can own in America. For example, machine guns have been federally regulated for nearly 90 years. And this is still a free country.
This isn’t about taking away anyone’s rights. It’s about protecting children. It’s about protecting families. It’s about protecting whole communities. It’s about protecting our freedoms to go to school, to a grocery store, and to a church without being shot and killed.
In an op-ed Biden wrote, "I have already taken more meaningful executive action to reduce gun violence than any other president, and I will continue to pursue every legal and effective action. But my power is not absolute. Congress must act, including banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, requiring gun owners to securely store their firearms, requiring background checks for all gun sales, and repealing gun manufacturers’ immunity from liability. We also need more governors and state legislators to take these steps."
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Trump hasn’t just failed to strengthen America’s gun laws in the wake of repeated mass shootings, he’s systematically gutted existing laws in ways that make kids and communities less safe:
Trump illegally narrowed the definition of “fugitive from justice” that’s used to determine who’s barred from buying a gun. For the purpose of the federal background check system for gun sales, the FBI had long interpreted “fugitive from justice” to include anyone with an outstanding arrest warrant. But less than one month into his Presidency, Trump’s DOJ directed the FBI’s background check operators to narrow the definition. The result? More individuals with outstanding arrest warrants, including for dangerous offenses, can now purchase guns.
Donald Trump illegally purged 500,000 records from the federal background check system.
Trump didn’t just narrow the definition of “fugitives from justice”: the Administration also removed all existing records in the federal background check system identifying fugitives who would be prohibited from purchasing guns. When Trump took office, the background check system contained entries for nearly 500,000 people who had been flagged as “fugitives from justice.” They purged all these records, and to date have only restored, about 1,000 entries under the category.
Donald Trump froze a rule that would have prohibited more people who are dangerous because they suffer from severe mental illness from buying guns. Federal law prohibits the sale of a firearm to any person who has been “adjudicated as a mentally defective” or “committed to a mental institution.” Those terms are old and unclear, and as a result, there are gaping loopholes in our gun laws. In 2014, the DOJ proposed a rule to fix this problem and prohibit certain people from buying guns, including those “committed to an outpatient mental institution,” “found incompetent to stand trial…in state, local and military courts,” and “found guilty but mentally ill by a court.” This important change would have kept guns out of the hands of those who are dangerous because of serious mental illness, but the gun lobby opposed the change. So instead of finalizing the rule, President Trump stopped it.
In a 2015 interview with gun magazine AmmoLand, the president said background checks don't need to be expanded — the current system isn't working.
"I do not support expanding background checks. The current background checks do not work," he told the magazine in an interview he promoted on his Twitter page.
After the Parkland shooting, the president pushed for stricter background checks. "Very strong improvement and strengthening of background checks will be fully backed by White House," he tweeted in March 2018. "Legislation moving forward. Bump Stocks will soon be out. Highly trained expert teachers will be allowed to conceal carry, subject to State Law."
But just in February, the president threatened to veto legislation that would have required background checks for most gun purchases or transfers. The legislation, which passed the House, never made it to the Senate floor.