Monday, President Barack Obama announced his plan to use an executive order on gun control and claimed he is confident his action will be “entirely consistent with the Second Amendment.”
Obama said, “I think everybody here is all too familiar with the statistics. We have tens of thousands of people every single year who are killed by guns. We have suicides that are committed by firearms at a rate that far exceeds other countries. We have a frequency of mass shootings that far exceeds other countries in frequency. And although it is my strong belief that for us to get our complete arms around the problem, Congress needs to act. What I asked my team to do is to see what more we could do to strengthen the enforcement and prevent guns from falling into the wrong hands to make sure that criminals, people who are mentally unstable, those who could pose a danger to themselves or others are less likely to get a gun. And I have just received back a report from Attorney General Lynch, Director Comey and Deputy Director Brandon about some of the ideas and initiatives they think can make a difference. And the good news is that these are not only recommendation 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 and believe in. So over the next several days we’ll be rolling out these initiatives. We’ll be making sure that people have a very clear understanding of what can make a difference and what we can do. And although we have to be very clear that this is not going to solve every violent crime in this country, it is not going to prevent every mass shooting, it is not going to keep every gun out of the hands of a criminal, it will potentially save lives in this country and spare families the pain and the extraordinary loss that they have suffered as a consequence of a firearm being in the hands of the wrong people.”
“I’m also confident that the recommendations that are being made by my team here are ones that are entirely consistent with the 2nd Amendment and people’s lawful right to bear arms. And we have been very careful recognizing that although we have a strong tradition of gun ownership in this country, that even those who possess firearms for hunting, for self protection and for other legitimate reasons want to make sure that the wrong people don’t have them for the wrong reasons. So I want to say how much I appreciate the outstanding work that the team’s done. Many of them worked over the holidays to get this set of recommendations to me. And I’m looking forward to speaking with the people over the next several days about them. okay? Thank you very much.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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