President Donald Trump reaffirmed his stance that there is “an appetite for background checks” despite reports that he told NRA head Wayne LaPierre that universal background check legislation is off the table.
Trump addressed background check legislation on Wednesday while speaking to reporters prior to departing for Louisville, Kentucky, where he will speak at an event and attend a fundraiser.
“I have an appetite for background checks. We’re going to be doing background checks. We’re working with Democrats. We’re working with Republicans. And we already have very strong background checks, but we’re going to be filling in some of the loopholes,” the president began. “So what happens is, with background checks, we’re dealing with Democrats, we’re dealing with Republicans, we’re dealing with the NRA, we’re dealing with gun owners, we’re dealing with everybody. And I think we’ll have something hopefully that’s meaningful.”
Trump added, “I didn’t say anything about that. We had a great talk with Wayne yesterday. Didn’t say anything about that. We just talked about concepts. Wayne agrees things have to be done also. And we have areas where we can close and, for instance, we did fix nix. We have a lot of background checks right now. Gun owners can tell you. Others can tell you that. But there are certain weaknesses. We want to fix the weaknesses and I think that will happen.”
Previous reports said that Trump took universal background checks off the table in that conversation with LaPierre.
The comments were at odds with statements the president made earlier this month.
“On background checks, we have tremendous support for really common sense, sensible, important background checks,” Trump told reporters on the White House lawn on Aug. 9, following mass shootings that left 31 people dead in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio.
Trump also pushed for strengthening background checks after the Parkland shooting but opted against it.
