US presidential candidates Sunday took aim at President Obama’s plans to tighten restrictions on gun ownership through an executive order, saying current laws should be enforced instead of creating new ones. Obama’s platform of expanded background checks, in order to legally purchase firearms, has met with stiff opposition from those who fear that such expansion could lead to even broader measures that may eventually criminalize all gun ownership.
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Federally licensed gun sellers by law have to seek criminal background checks before finalising a sale.
On Monday, US House Speaker Paul Ryan chided President Obama’s stance on gun rights. Gross says his recent conversations with White House aides have left him hopeful. “It’s places like California that are very liberal”, said Darling.
The President said this past Friday [January 1, 2016] he will meet with Attorney General Loretta Lynch on Monday to review how to move beyond Congress and use White House powers to reduce gun violence and the acquisition of guns, since Congress has apparently “done nothing” to make meaningful change on this issue.
Sources close to the president say he may take action before his January 12th State of the Union speech.
“That’s especially true for one piece of unfinished business, that’s our epidemic of gun violence”, he said.
A spokesman for the National Rifle Association, which has helped to block gun-control legislation in the past, called Obama’s new proposals a “political stunt”.
The president will hold a meeting in Virginia on Thursday to discuss gun violence and the proposed changes to background checks.
A poll conducted after the terrorist attack in California found 47 percent of Americans opposed new gun control measures, while 42 percent said they support gun control.
But after the shooting at a community college in Roseburg, Oregon in October, a tired and angry Obama ordered his staff to redouble the effort to look for ways to work around Congress.
“They run background checks here and it’s no different than if you were buying a gun at a gun store, a pawn shop or even Walmart”, he said.
Still, the President should be on firm Second Amendment ground if he pushes for a widening in the way the current law is applied, legal experts said.
Gun control is an extremely controversial topic in the United States, especially among the country’s leaders.
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“His first impulse is always to take rights away from law-abiding citizens”, Bush said, also on “Fox News Sunday”. Federal law enforcement knows who the “bad apples” are, which is why Brady, joined by members of Congress, mayors, and other public officials, has been calling on the Administration to take action to reform these “bad apples” or shut them down.
