The White House is confirming that President Joe Biden intends to push ahead with plans to increase gun control laws via executive order.
The news comes in the wake of two mass shootings earlier this month, in Atlanta and Boulder, Colo., in which a total of 18 people were killed. The violent episodes have renewed the debate over gun control, with Congress continuing to appear too sharply divided on the issue to make passage of legislation appear very likely.
As the Daily Caller reported, White House Press Secretary confirmed during Friday’s press briefing that Biden is planning to go the executive-order route.
“Yes,” Psaki said in answer to a question, the outlet wrote. “I can’t give you an exact time frame in part, because they have to go through a review process, which is something that we do from here.”
The Caller said that Psaki elaborated by pointing to Biden’s record while vice president under Barack Obama. “I will note that when we, when the president was the vice president in the Obama-Biden administration, he helped put in place twenty three executive actions to combat gun violence.”
She referred to executive orders as ” one of the levers that we can use that any federal government, any president, can use to help address the prevalence of gun violence and address community safety around the country.”
Biden himself spoke forcefully on the gun control issue earlier this week, after the shooting at a Boulder supermarket left 10 dead, including a police officer who was father to seven children.
The president called for a ban on assault weapons and tighter gun control measures. The Colorado shooting occurred days after a gunman visited three spas in and around Atlanta, killing eight people, six of them Asian women in an act some have branded a hate crime as well as a tragic act of gun violence.
“I don’t need to wait another minute, let alone another hour, to take common sense steps that will save lives in the future,” Biden said, adding that “we can ban assault weapons.”
“This is not and should not be a partisan issue,” Biden said at the White House. “It’s an American issue that will save lives, American lives. We must act.”
“We can ban assault weapons and high capacity magazines in this country, once again.”
The mass shooting in Boulder was carried out with an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle.
Newsmax wires contributed to this article.
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