United States President, Barack Obama, expressed his heart felt sentiments towards the recent shooting related tragedies that have been happening across the country in recent months, before he officially announced that he was going to be implementing a number of executive actions that is aimed at preventing any further gun-related violence.
“Every time I think about those kids, it gets me mad, and by the way, it happens on the streets of Chicago every day.” Obama mentioned as tears fell down his face.
The President then revealed the actions he and the administration will be taking which includes closing down the apparent loopholes that have been cited as the main reason why most firearms land in the wrong hands. The other actions include increasing the FBI staff responsible for running the background checks, improving the current mental health care system in the country, and lastly to research and apply better technological solutions to improve gun safety.
Obama then defended his decisions by stating that he does not want a partisan debate based on the last mass shooting, instead he is actually trying to prevent the next one from happening.
“Each time this comes up, we are fed the excuse that common sense reforms like background checks might not have stopped the last massacre, or the one before that or the one before that, so why bother trying? I reject that thinking.” Obama exclaimed.
The first agenda in the President’s unilateral action is to close the gun show and online sales loophole by requiring background checks for all these types of sales. The White House had then also announced that they will be bolstering their capabilities of running background checks efficiently by hiring up to 230 new staff members to help in the processing of the background checks. There will also be steps taken to modernize the current FBI National Instant Criminal Background Check system.
The administration also proposed a $500 million budget for improving the country’s current mental health care system. Along with this is a 2017 budget that will employ an additional 200 new ATF agents to help enforce the current laws.
Lastly, a presidential memorandum was issued which instructed the Justice, Defense, and Homeland Security departments to research new and improved ways to apply “smart gun” technologies into existing firearms.
Obama assured the public that the actions were well thought of and do not infringe on the citizen’s Second Amendment rights, with most actually being recommended by the Attorney General, the ATF Deputy Director, and the FBI Director.