President Obama used part of his speech Tuesday to renew calls for gun control, warning that failing to enact new gun laws will allow San Bernardino- and Orlando-style terrorist attacks “to keep on happening.”
“If we really want to help law enforcement protect Americans from homegrown extremists—the kind of tragedies that occurred at San Bernardino and that now have occurred in Orlando—there is a meaningful way to do that. We have to make it harder for people who want to kill Americans to get their hands on weapons of war that let them kill dozens of innocents,” Obama said.
The shooters in the December San Bernardino attack were armed with illegally altered .223-caliber semiautomatic weapons. The Orlando killer used a different .223-caliber weapon, according to law enforcement, the Sig Sauer MCX carbine. The U.S. government described the gun as an “AR type rifle.” AR-15-style rifles have been targeted by Democratic lawmakers and gun control advocates since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012.
The president said individuals shouldn’t be able to purchase such “assault weapons” in the name of fighting terrorism.
“Enough talking about being tough on terrorism. Actually be tough on terrorism, and stop making it easy as possible for terrorists to buy assault weapons. Reinstate the assault weapons ban. Make it harder for terrorists to use these weapons to kill us,” Obama said. “Otherwise, despite extraordinary efforts across our government by local law enforcement, by our intelligence agencies, by our military—despite all the sacrifices that folks make, these kinds of events are going to keep on happening, and the weapons are only going to get more powerful.”
In his remarks, Obama also resumed talk about a firearms purchase ban for people on the terror watch list. In December, Democrats blocked a Republican alternative that would have delayed the sale of a gun to a person on the terror watch list for 72 hours while the government attempted to establish probable cause to deny the sale outright.
