WASHINGTON, DC – JANUARY 20: U.S. President Joe Biden prepares to sign a series of executive orders at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
President Joe Biden on Sunday urged Congress to pass reforms to existing laws concerning gun ownership on the anniversary of the mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida.
“The Parkland students and so many other young people across the country who have experienced gun violence are carrying forward the history of the American journey. It is a history written by young people in each generation who challenged prevailing dogma to demand a simple truth: we can do better. And we will,” Biden said in a statement.
“This Administration will not wait for the next mass shooting to heed that call. We will take action to end our epidemic of gun violence and make our schools and communities safer. Today, I am calling on Congress to enact commonsense gun law reforms, including requiring background checks on all gun sales, banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and eliminating immunity for gun manufacturers who knowingly put weapons of war on our streets.”
In the afternoon on Feb. 14, 2018, a man walked into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and began opening fire.
The shooting left 17 dead, including 14 students.
Authorities identified the shooter as Nikolas Cruz.
Cruz told a detective that he was the shooter and that demons in his head told him to kill.
Cruz’s trial has still not taken place. He is facing the death penalty.
After the shooting, a number of Parkland students and parents began agitating for stricter gun control laws, arguing Cruz shouldn’t have been able to obtain a gun.
But others pointed to failures by law enforcement, including safety officer Scot Peterson, who refused to confront Cruz despite being armed, and urged restraint on new measures.
Biden said during the 2020 campaign that he supports stronger gun control and last week administration officials met with gun control advocates, including Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action, and John Feinblatt, president of Everytown.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters afterwards that the administration is ready to move on the “ambitious plan” Biden laid out during the campaign.
Biden’s campaign website says he will “defeat” the National Rifle Association (NRA). Among his proposed actions is repealing the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which protects gun manufacturers from some lawsuits, banning so-called assault weapons, as Congress did for 10 years in 1994, and forcing people to either give up certain guns and magazines or register them with the federal government.
The NRA’s lobbying arm has fired back at Biden, saying he wants to ban “America’s most popular class of centerfire rifles, as well on the factory-spec magazines for most of the defensive pistols sold in the U.S.”
“Just as when Joe Biden unsuccessfully pursued gun control as Barack Obama’s vice-president, your NRA is fully prepared to oppose whatever plans he may have to ‘defeat’ America’s largest and oldest civil rights organization and the fundamental liberties it protects,” it added in a recent blog post.
Gun control advocacy groups are pushing both executive orders and legislative packages they believe will help lead to fewer deaths by gunfire.
Democrats control both chambers of Congress in addition to the White House, but would require some Republican support in the Senate to pass new bills.
Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) and Ted Deutch (D-Fla.) on Sunday also highlighted the shooting anniversary.
“As we honor the anniversary of this tragedy, we must also find the strength as a nation to prevent such tragedies from ever being repeated. With President Biden in the White House, we finally have the opportunity to make real strides to end gun violence. No survivor should endure another year of inaction. The fear of mass gun violence for Americans doing the most normal of activities, as well as gun violence in too many neighborhoods across the country, must be brought to an end with congressional action,” Wasserman Schultz said in a statement.
“On this day I recommit to ensure that the names of the 17 victims are never forgotten in the halls of Congress and to honor their memory with action that will make our communities safer from gun violence,” added Deutch.