WASHINGTON — Administration officials say that President Obama, largely silent about gun control since the Tucson shooting carnage, will address the issue soon, potentially reopening a long-dormant debate on one of the nation’s most politically volatile issues.
The officials did not indicate what measures, if any, Mr. Obama might support; with Republicans in control of the House and many Democrats fearful of the gun lobby’s power, any legislation faces long odds for passage. Among the skeptics is the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada.
Still, Mr. Obama has come under increased pressure to speak out from gun-control advocates, including urban Democrats in Congress and liberal activists and editorial writers. They would like him to at least support a bill that would restore an expired federal ban on the sort of high-capacity ammunition magazine that was used in the Jan. 8 shootings in Tucson that killed six people and injured 13, including Representative Gabrielle Giffords, Democrat of Arizona.
The advocates, including Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York, were critical after Mr. Obama did not propose any measures in his State of the Union address Tuesday night to address gun violence. In interviews since, senior White House advisers have said without specifics that Mr. Obama would address the issue in coming weeks, though just how has not been decided.
“I wouldn’t rule out that at some point the president talks about the issues surrounding gun violence,” Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, told reporters on Wednesday. “I don’t have a timetable or, obviously, what he would say.”
David Axelrod, a senior adviser to the president, separately told reporters that Mr. Obama would “no doubt” speak out before long.
Mr. Bloomberg, who is co-chairman of a group called Mayors Against Illegal Guns, said in his weekly radio address on Friday that he was newly “encouraged” because “some of the president’s staff said that he was planning a speech on the problem and on guns and what he would do, and I think that’s great if he does that.”
When several White House aides were asked about that comment, each referred to Mr. Gibbs’s earlier comment.
Representative Carolyn McCarthy, a Democrat of New York who has introduced legislation to ban magazines that hold more than 10 rounds, said she was hopeful that Mr. Obama would now respond to “the pressure that’s been coming out from all the different groups and almost every paper I know of.”
Such a ban was part of a broader law banning many assault weapons that was enacted in 1994 by a Democratic-controlled Congress and allowed to expire 10 years later when Republicans were in control. Many Democrats have shied from gun legislation ever since 1994, blaming the loss of their House and Senate majorities that year partly on the assault weapons ban, which enraged the gun lobby, in particular the National Rifle Association.
Ms. McCarthy, who won election in 1996 as a gun-control crusader, three years after her husband was killed and her son injured by a man who opened fire on passengers on a Long Island commuter train, said, “I don’t see how anybody could get the assault weapons ban passed in this kind of climate with the N.R.A.”
But a ban on high-capacity magazines is possible, she said, adding, “If I didn’t think I could pass something, I wouldn’t push as hard as I’ve been pushing.”
Mr. Obama supported gun-control legislation as a state senator in Illinois, and as a presidential candidate he opposed laws allowing concealed weapons and endorsed those requiring tougher background checks of gun buyers and a permanent assault weapons ban. But as president he has been a big disappointment to gun-control groups.
A year ago, one of the main groups, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, gave him an “F” for his first year in office. Its report cited, among other things, his signing of a law permitting people to carry concealed weapons in national parks and in checked luggage on Amtrak trains, and his failure to name a director for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
“Not only did he not champion the cause, he actually signed bad legislation into law,” said Dennis A. Henigan, vice president of the Brady Campaign.
Mr. Obama recently nominated Andrew Traver, chief of the firearms bureau’s Chicago office, as director of the agency. Mr. Traver immediately drew N.R.A. opposition, throwing his Senate confirmation into jeopardy. And the administration recently proposed rules to require gun sellers in states bordering Mexico to report multiple sales of rifles and shotguns, to stem gun trafficking to Mexican drug cartels.
Mr. Henigan called those actions “encouraging signs.” He added, “The White House has certainly been sending signals that it realizes that it can’t go forward avoiding the word ‘gun,’ which is basically what it did for two years.”
No comments:
Post a Comment