NEW YORK TIMES
Four days before taking the oath of office, President Obama on Wednesday staked the beginning of his second term on an uphill quest to pass the broadest gun control legislation in a generation.
In the aftermath of the Connecticut school massacre, Mr. Obama vowed to rally public opinion to press a reluctant Congress to ban military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, expand background checks, and toughen gun-trafficking laws. Recognizing that the legislative fight could be long and difficult, the president also took immediate steps by issuing a series of executive actions intended to reduce gun violence.
Surrounded by children who wrote him letters seeking curbs on guns, Mr. Obama committed himself to a high-profile and politically volatile campaign behind proposals assembled by Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. that will test the administration’s strength heading into the next four years. The first big push of Mr. Obama’s second term, then, will come on an issue that was not even on his to-do list on Election Day when voters renewed his lease on the presidency.
The emotionally charged ceremony, attended by family members of those killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., reflected a decision by the White House to seize on public outrage to challenge the political power of the National Rifle Association and other forces that have successfully fought new gun laws for decades.
[Hey, NRA, the century is not even 13 years old, declaring a “fight of the century” might be a bit premature. The nation’s largest gun lobby vowed to use all their resources to fight President Obama in a fundraising letter distributed on Wednesday— “I warned you this day was coming and now it is here,” NRA president Wayne LaPierre declares in the leaflet, which is being circulated at the 35th Annual Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade Show in Las Vegas. On Wednesday, the NRA and other gun advocacy groups spend the whole day in closed-door meetings to draft a response to Obama’s proposal to reduce gun violence, which included a ban on assault weapons, higher-capacity magazine guns, and stricter background checks.]
The N.R.A. made clear that it was ready for a fight. [see above] Even before the president’s speech, it broadcast a provocative video calling Mr. Obama an “elitist hypocrite” for opposing more armed guards in schools while his daughters had Secret Service protection [see below].
[Stay classy, National Rifle Association. The gun-lobbying group released a video on Tuesday that calls President Obama an “elitist hypocrite” for using Secret Service protection for his daughters. “Are the president’s kids more important than yours?” the video asks. “Then why is he skeptical about putting armed security in our schools when his kids are protected by armed guards at their schools?” The NRA denied that the ad is about Malia and Sasha Obama, with spokesman Andrew Arulanandam saying that "misses the point entirely." Arulanadam said the ad is about "keeping our children safe," and about the president's skepticism about schools having armed security guards when he and his family have them. The White House called the ad "repugnant and cowardly" and spokesman Jay Carney said that the president's children should not be used as "pawns in a political fight."]
After the speech the group said it would work to secure schools, fix the mental health system and prosecute criminals but criticized the president’s other proposals. “Attacking firearms and ignoring children is not a solution to the crisis we face as a nation,” the N.R.A. said in a statement. “Only honest, law-abiding gun owners will be affected, and our children will remain vulnerable to the inevitability of more tragedy.”
Mr. Obama’s plan included 4 major legislative proposals and 23 executive actions that he initiated on his own authority to bolster enforcement of existing laws, improve the nation’s database used for background checks and otherwise make it harder for criminals and people with mental illness to get guns.
Mr. Obama asked Congress to reinstate and strengthen a ban on the sale and production of assault weapons that passed in 1994 and expired in 2004. He also called for a ban on the sale and production of magazines with more than 10 rounds, like those used in Newtown and other mass shootings. Mr. Obama’s plan would require criminal background checks for all gun sales, closing the longstanding loophole that allows buyers to avoid screening by purchasing weapons from unlicensed sellers at gun shows or in private sales. Nearly 40 percent of all gun sales are exempt from the system.
He also proposed legislation banning the possession or transfer of armor-piercing bullets and cracking down on “straw purchasers,” those who pass background checks and then forward guns to criminals or others forbidden from purchasing them.
For Mr. Obama, the plan represented a political pivot. While he has always expressed support for an assault weapons ban, he has made no real effort to pass it on the assumption that the votes were not there. But he and the White House are banking on the idea that the Newtown shooting has changed the dynamics. “I have never seen the nation’s conscience so shaken by what happened at Sandy Hook,” Mr. Biden said Wednesday. “The world has changed and is demanding action.”
AGENDA FACES UNCERTAIN FATE IN CONGRESS
WASHINGTON POST
As important as the executive actions are, Obama said, “they are in no way a substitute” for the legislative proposals he sent to Congress.
But on Capitol Hill, where two decades of gun-control efforts have landed in the political graveyard, leaders of Obama’s own party do not necessarily share his views.
Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) stopped short of embracing Obama’s proposals, calling them “thoughtful recommendations” and saying that he would “consider legislation that addresses gun violence and other aspects of violence in our society early this year.”
The gun-control agenda that President Obama unveiled with urgency on Wednesday now faces an uncertain fate in a bitterly divided Congress, where Republican opposition hardened and centrist Democrats remained noncommittal after a month of feverish public debate.
By pursuing an expansive overhaul of the nation’s gun laws, Obama is wagering that public opinion has evolved enough after a string of mass shootings to force passage of politically contentious measures that Congress has long stymied.
Yet there was no indication on Wednesday that the mood on Capitol Hill has changed much. Within hours of Obama’s formal policy rollout at the White House, Republicans who had previously said they were open to a discussion about gun violence condemned his agenda as violating the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms.
“I’m confident there will be bipartisan opposition to his proposal,” Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) said in a statement.
The Senate plans to begin taking up Obama’s proposals next week, with the House waiting to see what the Democrat-controlled Senate passes first, congressional aides said. The Senate is likely to take a piecemeal approach, eventually holding up-or-down votes on the individual elements of Obama’s plan rather than trying to muscle through a single comprehensive bill, aides said.