President Trump: Stronger Background Checks Would Not Stop Attacks

While speaking to reporters Sunday morning President Trump said stronger background checks would not have stopped the mass public attacks our nation has witnessed over the past six or seven years.

Trump said, “I will say that for the most part, sadly if you look at the last four or five going back even five or six or seven years, for the most part, as strong as you make your background checks, they would not have stopped any of it.”

He made these comments the day after a man in the Midland-Odessa region of Texas drove around shooting people while sitting inside his vehicle.

The New York Times reports that Trump assured reporters he is “speaking with Republicans and Democrats on possible legislative efforts regarding guns,” but no other details were forthcoming.

On August 5–just days after the heinous attacks in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio–Trump called for bipartisan action for “strong background checks.” He reiterated that call on August 7 then appeared to slowly shift away from that position.

On August 20, Breitbart News reported Trump saying, “We have very, very strong background checks right now. But we have, sort of, missing areas and areas that don’t complete the whole circle. And we’re looking at different things.”

On August 19, Politico quoted Trump saying, “Congress is going to be reporting back to me with ideas. And they’ll come in from Democrats and Republicans. And I’ll look at it very strongly. But just remember, we already have a lot of background checks.”

NBC reports Trump saying the shooting incidents in the Midland-Odessa area do not change discussions about guns. Trump said, “We are in the process of dealing with Democrats and Republicans, and there’s a big package of things that’s going to be put before them by a lot of different people I’ve been speaking to a lot of senators, a lot of house members, Republicans, Democrats — this really hasn’t changed anything, we’re doing a package and we’ll see how it comes about.”

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.