Obama wipes away tears as he calls for new gun measures

Politico

President Barack Obama wept openly Tuesday as he delivered a forceful defense of new executive actions on gun violence, a set of modest proposals to tighten loopholes that likely face quick legal challenges and could be vulnerable to reversal by a Republican White House.

The president ran through a list of mass shootings that have happened during his time in office, and teared up as he recalled the schoolchildren gunned down in Newtown, Connecticut in 2012.  

“First graders in Newtown. First graders,” Obama said, pausing to collect himself. “Every time I think about those kids, it gets me mad. And by the way, it happens on the streets of Chicago every day.”

Obama offered a new argument to counter gun rights enthusiasts, noting that mass shootings have taken place as Americans have tried to exercise other rights, such as attending worship services or watching a movie. The right to bear firearms is not more important than the right to worship freely or peaceably assemble, he said, and called upon Congress to be “brave enough to stand up to the gun lobby’s lies.”

“Every single year, more than 30,000 Americans have their lives cut short by guns. Thirty thousand. Suicides, domestic violence, gang shootouts, accidents. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have lost brothers and sisters or buried their own children,” he remarked.

“Many have had to learn to live with a disability or learn to live without the love of their life. A number of those people are here today. They can tell you some stories,” he continued. “In this room right here, there are a lot of stories. There’s a lot of heartache. There’s a lot of resilience, there’s a lot of strength, but there’s also a lot of pain. And this is just a small sample.”

Despite the “general consensus” for what needs to be done, and support from many gun owners, Obama acknowledged gridlock.

“I’m not on the ballot again. I’m not looking to score some points. I think we can disagree without impugning other people’s motives,” he said. “But we do have to feel a fierce sense of urgency about it. In Dr. King’s words, we need to feel the fierce urgency of now. Because people are dying and the constant excesses for action no longer do, no longer suffice. That’s why we’re here today, not to debate the last mass shooting but to prevent the next one.”

In making his case, Obama brushed off criticism that he did not respect the Second Amendment, citing his past as a constitutional law professor.

“No matter how many times people try to twist my words around, I taught constitutional law, I know a little bit about this. I get it,” he said. “But I also believe that we can find ways to reduce gun violence consistent with the Second Amendment.”

“We do not have to accept this carnage as the price of freedom,” Obama said.

The issue of gun violence has been a perpetual presence during Obama’s presidency due to a series of mass shootings that have grabbed national headlines, perhaps none more so than the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook.

“Fort Hood, Binghamton, Aurora, Oak Creek, Newtown, the Navy Yard, Santa Barbara, Charleston, San Bernardino. Too many,” Obama said, ticking through a list of mass shootings since the 2011 Tucson shooting that killed six and injured more than a dozen more, including former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), who was in attendance in the East Room.

The father of Daniel Barden, a 7-year-old boy shot to death at Sandy Hook, introduced Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.

“Far too many more lives have been lost to gun tragedies in this country,” Mark Barden said. “Far too many people right now who are hearing these words are grieving the loss of a loved one to gun violence. As a nation, we have to do better. We are better. We’re better than this.”

Despite professing an unflinching commitment to curbing gun violence, Obama and Biden have been thwarted by Congress and what Obama calls a lack of national will to change the way Americans think about guns.

Obama has issued more than 20 executive actions, including incentives for states to share background check information and directing the attorney general to review those types of individuals prohibited from having guns. But gun sales have only soared, with 2015 expected to have been a record year, as Americans fear new restrictions.

Likewise, the actions rolling out on Tuesday are not expected to have a huge impact.

The actions include a more detailed definition of which gun sellers must apply for a federal dealers license — and therefore conduct background checks for all sales, in a bid to close the so-called gun show loophole. The administration is also finalizing a few other rules that were stuck in a bureaucratic backlog, including new requirements for reporting guns lost or stolen in transit, and a measure that would allow more mental health records to be submitted to the federal background check registry by removing patient privacy limits.

The FBI is also adding 230 agents devoted to processing background checks — a 50 percent increase — as it moves toward automating the system.

White House Senior Adviser Valerie Jarrett hit the airwaves to promote the actions on Tuesday morning, telling MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that Obama feels a need to act because Congress won’t.

“Nothing has frustrated him more than Congress’s unwillingness to act on this issue since he’s been in office,” Jarrett said. “We still want to put pressure on Congress to do the right thing and we’re going to need the American people to help us do that. But in the meantime the president is going to take the steps that he can to keep guns out of the wrong hands.”

But House Speaker Paul Ryan immediately blasted the forthcoming actions, and hinted on Monday that legal challenges were inevitable.

“While we don’t yet know the details of the plan, the president is at minimum subverting the legislative branch, and potentially overturning its will,” Ryan said in a statement. “His proposals to restrict gun rights were debated by the United States Senate, and they were rejected. No president should be able to reverse legislative failure by executive fiat, not even incrementally.”

Obama has often turned to executive actions, especially once he both chambers on Congress became controlled by Republicans, with many of his actions, including those on immigration reforms, now mired in court challenges.

Obama himself acknowledged the forthcoming legal debate, saying on Monday that he believes he is on solid ground.

“These are not only recommendations that are well within my legal authority and the executive branch, but they’re also ones that the overwhelming majority of the American people, including gun owners, support me doing,” Obama told reporters after an Oval Office meeting on Monday with his top law enforcement officials.

The series of gun-related events this week represents one of Obama’s largest pushes on gun control since the collapse of the effort that followed the 2012 Sandy Hook mass shooting. The White House is eager to fend off political attacks and to minimize the lobbying from pro-guns-rights groups, and so is preparing a heavy public campaign to explain his moves. On Thursday, Obama partners with CNN for an hourlong town hall to discuss gun violence in prime time.

While Obama cannot unilaterally required universal background checks, top administration officials predicted the new guidelines would sweep in all but the most casual sellers. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms will issue new guidelines about what it means to be “engaged in the business” of selling guns, rather than merely selling them as a hobby. It’s part of a bid to step up enforcement of background check rules not only at informal settings like flea markets and gun shows, but also the Internet — including the dark web.

The administration could not say how many people would likely be affected by the new measures.

In a Tuesday op-ed for the Gazette in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Jeb Bush slammed what he called Obama’s opportunism and “utter disregard for the Second Amendment as well as the proper constitutional process for making laws in our nation.”

“Liberals like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton seize on every opportunity to advance a gun-grabbing agenda,” he wrote.

Even as gun control advocates have praised the White House’s efforts, they pledge to still push Congress and Obama to do more.

The National Rifle Association, meanwhile, has blanketed the airwaves with ads warning of “a government that would disarm us during the age of terror.”

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