President Joe Biden touted the impact of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act as an “important first step” and called on Congress to take further action to combat gun violence while delivering remarks at the National Safer Communities Summit in Connecticut on Friday.
“If this Congress refuses to act, we need a new Congress,” Biden said in his remarks at the summit.
The president reiterated his call for Congress to pass a bill banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, something he has repeatedly pushed for after a number of mass shootings this year. He noted Congress passed an assualt weapons ban in 1994, but it expired in 2004.
“One year ago, we did come together. We did hear the call from too many families,” Biden said on Friday, referring to the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.
Biden signed the act in June of last year, marking the most sweeping and significant gun legislation to become law in decades. The bipartisan compromise came in response to a series of mass shootings, including the massacre of 19 students and two teachers at a Texas elementary school.
“It is the most important piece of legislation that has happened in 30 years, federally,” Joshua Horwitz Director of the John Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions said.
The bill kept firearms from more domestic violence offenders, helped states put in place red flag laws that make it easier for authorities to take weapons from people adjudged to be dangerous and toughened background checks for the youngest gun buyers.
“We did overcome an unrelenting opposition from the gun lobby to gun manufacturers and so many politicians who hide behind the belief that they will never have to pay a price for their inaction when they oppose common-sense gun legislation,” Biden said. “And we beat them. We beat them, and we did it through a bipartisan effort that included a majority of responsible gun owners.”
The agreement was forged by Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn.
Murphy introduced Biden at the summit, which took place at the University of Hartford, praising the president for his work on this issue dating back to his time as a senator.
“Joe Biden was fighting and beating the gun lobby before anybody else was,” Murphy said.
Murphy, a longtime gun safety advocate, previously represented Newtown, Connecticut, in the House. Newtown was the site of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting that left 20 students and six educators dead.
During his remarks, Biden highlighted Connecticut’s action on gun legislation, pointing out that Gov. Ned Lamont earlier this month signed the most wide-ranging state gun control bill since 2013, and called on other states to take more action.
Horwitz said the U.S. has seen a record number of firearm sales and there was a dramatic rise starting at the beginning of the pandemic in March of 2020.
It will be difficult to pass any significant gun safety legislation in this session of Congress with the GOP in control of the House. Many Republicans argue that restricting gun access infringes on Constitutional rights and makes Americans less safe.
“I refuse to allow the erosion of our Second Amendment rights to further disarm our population,” Rep. Wesley Hunt, R-Texas, said this week during discussion over blocking the Biden administration’s rule related to pistol braces.
Biden on Friday also pointed to his individual actions as president, including the pistol brace rule and cracking down on so-called ghost guns.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
