Biden and a new attempt to regulate weapons, a fight in which he has been immersed for more than three decades

“The idea that we still allow the purchase of semi-automatic weapons is sick. Just sick (…) I’m going to try to make assault weapons disappear, “said the US president Joe Biden during the dinner of Thanksgiving held last Thursday.

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It consists of the most recent pronouncement of the Democratic leader against arms control, an issue that sparks an intense debate between those who consider it a fundamental citizen right and those who see the increase in the danger of violence that has afflicted the country for decades.

The most recent injury from the so-called gun epidemic in the United States are the shootings at a gay nightclub in Colorado and at a supermarket in Virginia earlier this week.

Both tragedies, which occurred three days apart, left a total of 11 dead, according to US authorities.

According to the Gun Violence Archive organization, dedicated to monitoring these types of incidents in the United States, some 39,952 people have died due to gun violence so far in 2022.

AN ETERNAL FIGHT

Protected by the Second Amendment to the Constitution, in force since 1791, Americans are empowered to bear arms for their legitimate defense. Since the 20th century, however, the law has become one of the most debated points in that country, both in the civil, political and judicial spheres.

Despite the fact that this right has been ratified on more than one occasion by the Supreme Court, there have been many occasions in which it has sought to regulate the access that citizens have, especially to weapons for military use.

It should be noted that within this debate, and of the numerous decisions of Congress, the lobby carried out by influential organizations such as the powerful National Rifle Association has stood out. (NRA).

And if anyone knows very well about this, it is precisely Joe Biden. Since his time as a Delaware senator, which began in the early 1970s and saw his last re-election in 2002, he has spearheaded different initiatives to regulate citizen access to firearms.

This evidently included more than one run-in with the NRA. In this sense, two victories by the Democrat stand out. First in 1993, when Congress passed the Brady Gun Violence Prevention Act that established a background check system for those applying for a firearm.

And a year later, when together with Senator Dianne Feinstein they pushed for a 10-year ban on assault weapons and ammunition of the same type.

In 2012, after the Sandy Hook school massacre and already as vice president, Biden was tasked by then-president Barack Obama in efforts to further limit gun sales.

The truth is that despite the fact that the Obama-Biden duo carried out more than a dozen decrees to reduce the use of weapons, the epidemic of violence in the United States has not shown notable reductions since then.

A SIGNIFICANT BUT INSUFFICIENT ACHIEVEMENT

Already as president, Biden has sought ways to continue his fight against access to firearms. A job that has been applauded by various pro-regulation organizations, but which the president himself has described as insufficient, since they need a greater consensus on an issue that Republicans widely oppose.

In June of this year, a month after the shootings at a school in Uvalde, Texas, and at a store in Buffalo, New York, however, he scored a small but important victory.

Biden got the minimum necessary support from Democratic and Republican congressmen to push through a law that introduces new restrictions on the carrying of weapons and allocates billions of dollars to mental health and school safety programs.

This law, considered the most important in the last 30 years on the subject, includes a review of the process for purchasing weapons for those under 21 years of age and extends the so-called “danger alert” regulations (“Red Flag ”), which allow the activation of a legal procedure to confiscate the firearms of those who represent a danger to third parties or to themselves, reports the EFE news agency.

At the same time, it sought to put an end to what is known as the “boyfriend loophole”, whereby until now if someone was accused of domestic violence without being married, they were allowed to continue owning weapons, something that does not happen in the case of married people.

The measure, however, has not yet entered into force as it is pending a vote in the Senate, where it does not project to have the necessary votes.

Now, after the midterm elections have given control of the Lower House to the Republicans but kept the Senate in the hands of the Democrats, the Biden Administration seeks to race against the clock to carry out new measures before the start of the new period legislature on January 3.

“When did we decide that enough is enough?… We have to impose an assault weapons ban to get the weapons of war off the streets of the United States,” the president said in this regard.

In this sense, we will have to wait to find out what the movements of the Democrats will be in the weeks in which they still maintain the majority in both chambers. A wait that Biden already seems to be used to after three decades fighting for results.

Source: Elcomercio

jack

I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.