U.S. President Joe Biden has used a primetime television address to beseech lawmakers in Congress to pass common-sense gun-control legislation after yet another rise in mass shootings in the country.
Biden said that since the attack in Uvalde Texas where 19 school children and two teachers were killed, there had been 20 other mass shootings in America including in Tulsa, Oklahoma on Wednesday where four people were shot to death at a medical centre.
Biden laid down specific actions he’d like to see Congress enact, including a ban on assault weapons like the AR15 used in most of these mass shootings.
“Here’s what the majority of American people believe we must do – here’s what the families of Buffalo and Uvalde in Texas told us we must do. 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, and address the mental health crisis.”
Meanwhile, the House of Representatives is currently debating the ‘Protecting Our Kids Act’ which, among others, would raise the age limit for purchasing semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21 while making it an offence to import, manufacture or possess large-capacity magazines, creating a grant programme to buy back such magazines.
Biden said this was the moment to finally do something as he echoed sentiments expressed to him by the families of the victims of the most recent mass shootings.
U.S. Senators meet in an effort to find consensus on gun policy: 1 June 2022
