Trump wavers on guns after NRA meeting
Turnabout in just a few days worries Democrats seeking change
WASHINGTON – Days after a meeting at the White House where President Donald Trump embraced bipartisan gun control provisions, the administration softened its support for stricter gun control. Such a move, Democratic leaders warned, could hurt the president’s standing with voters.
At a bipartisan meeting Wednesday, Trump called on lawmakers to work together to come up with a “comprehensive” and “beautiful” bill that would address gun violence after a school shooting Feb. 14 in Parkland, Florida, in which 17 students and teachers were killed.
“I’d rather have you come up with a strong, strong bill, and really strong on background checks,” Trump told lawmakers in the meeting. He signaled an openness to a ban on assault weapons and said he’d like to see guns taken from mentally ill people first and go through legal due process second.
Trump urged Sens. Pat Toomey, RPa., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., to use their bipartisan proposal to expand background checks as a base bill and encouraged other lawmakers to work with them to expand it.
After the meeting, Toomey said the president was “very supportive of the substance of it – the specific bill. He was encouraging us to move this.”
But Trump met with NRA officials in the Oval Office on Thursday and then changed course.
On Friday, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said on Fox that Trump “has not fully gotten on board with” the expanded background check sponsored by Toomey and Manchin. She said the administration wouldn’t weigh in until the bill was finished.
Sanders said the president supported a bill introduced by Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Chris Murphy, DConn., that would boost authorities’ reporting to the National Instant Criminal
“The hard right puts pressure on him, in this case the NRA, and he does a total 180-degree flip. It makes one feel that when America really needs something ... the president just succumbs to the group that puts the most pressure on him, in this case the NRA.”
Chuck Schumer D-N.Y.
Background Check System.
Sanders said what Trump wanted to see related to background checks is “largely done” by the Cornyn-Murphy bill. During the bipartisan meeting, Trump said he liked the “Fix NICS” legislation but wanted “it much more comprehensive.”
Thursday night, top NRA lobbyist Chris Cox said the president and vice president “don’t want gun control.”
Friday morning, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., urged Trump to go “with his instincts” and not the NRA on the issue.
“The hard right puts pressure on him, in this case the NRA, and he does a total 180-degree flip,” Schumer said. “It makes one feel that when America really needs something ... the president just succumbs to the group that puts the most pressure on him, in this case the NRA.”
Schumer said it became clear while working with Trump on immigration that “negotiating with him is like negotiating with Jell-O.”
“The president on national TV said very clearly he supported addressing gun violence in a comprehensive way and specifically endorsed expanded background check legislation,” said Drew Hamill, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s spokesman. He said polling shows Americans support tougher gun laws.
Murphy is one of the most vocal gun control advocates in Congress and says he sees the Fix NICS bill as just the first step of many. He was at the White House meeting Wednesday. Friday, he said that despite the White House’s retreat on the issue, Trump’s instinct on guns “is not wrong.”
Contributing: Nicole Guadiano