After recording a year with the lowest level of public mass shootings in more than a decade, the US suffered its second such incident in less than a week on Monday night with a shooting at a Colorado grocery store that killed 10, including one police officer.
Joe Biden addressed the shooting on Tuesday, calling for swift legislation to be passed, and once again lowering the White House flag to half-staff after he had called for it to be lowered after last week’s mass shooting in Atlanta.
The president called on Congress to close the loopholes in the background checks system and to once again ban assault weapons. He specifically urged the Senate to pass the two background checks bills that the House approved earlier this month.
“I don’t need to wait another minute, let alone an hour, to take commonsense steps that will save lives in the future,” Biden said. “This is not and should not be a partisan issue. It is an American issue.”
It is unclear whether the bills can make it through the evenly divided Senate, given Republicans’ general opposition to gun restrictions.
Asked whether Biden was considering executive action to address gun violence, the White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said the president was considering a number of options.
“There’s an ongoing process, and I think we feel we have to work on multiple channels at the same time,” Psaki said.
Gun safety advocates including Barack Obama also called for immediate action by Congress to address the resurgent national epidemic as the country emerges from a year of lockdowns and social distancing sparked by the coronavirus pandemics.
