The nation’s major newspapers this week stepped up their calls for gun control, after a shooting in Parkland, Florida left 17 dead and many more injured.
President Trump indicated Thursday that he wants to focus on improving the ways state and local governments respond to possibly mentally ill people who seek out guns. But several papers said that’s not nearly enough.
The Washington Post said it’s time to “ban these weapons of war.”
“That the suspected 19-year-old gunman in the Florida shooting was able to legally purchase an AR-15 rifle despite concerns about his mental health, a social media fixation with guns, alleged involvement with a white-nationalist group and boasts about killing animals underscores the complete failure of America’s political class to come to grips — or even to try to come to grips — with gun violence,” the Post’s editorial board wrote.
The Post said a ban is needed on the AR-15, which has been used over and over again in these shootings.
“It is time for a national ban on their sale and possession,” it said. “Now, before the next set of parents face the unimaginable agony of the phone call that never gets answered.”
The New York Times didn’t explicitly call for any type of gun control, but encouraged voters to stand up to “gun rights extremists and industry lobbyists.”
“[T]he gun lobby’s stranglehold on our elected officials does not need to continue, if candidates stand up to the lobby and voters demand that they commit themselves to the sorts of changes that a vast majority of Americans want,” the Times’ editorial board wrote.
“With midterm elections coming up this fall, America has a chance to get that message across. Candidates must realize that reducing gun violence is a winning and moral issue,” it said. “Aggressive turnout by voters who believe this can defeat the N.R.A. at the polls. Until then, the bloodshed will continue.”
USA Today argued a ban is needed on “high muzzle velocity” weapons that can easily kill in one shot, and suggested an age limit.
“The Second Amendment guarantees a constitutional right to bear arms, but it does not preclude reasonable regulation of the most destructive weapons, according to the Supreme Court’s Heller decision, written by the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia,” USA Today’s editorial board wrote.
“Does it make any sense that, in Florida and other states, you can’t buy a drink until you are 21 but can purchase a firearm when you are 18 and your brain is still developing?” the paper asked.
The New York Post called for a reinstatement of the federal assault weapons ban, and raising the age at which people can buy weapons.
It also called for a ban on bump stocks, an accessory that can be used so that semi-automatic weapons can fire at the rate of automatic weapons, and end the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act.
“Mr. President, this is your moment,” the Post’s board said. “You can keep your promises to the kids and the parents and honor your offer to do ‘whatever we can do.'”
