MINNEAPOLIS — President Barack Obama vowed Monday to keep pushing Congress to reinstate a federal assault weapons ban amid resistance even from within his own party and said he sees a consensus emerging for universal background checks on gun buyers.
After meeting with local, state and federal law enforcement officials at the Minneapolis Police Department’s special operations center, Obama said Americans should pressure their elected representatives to support his agenda.
“There’s no legislation to eliminate all guns,” said Obama, a Democrat. “Tell them now is the time for action.”
At the start of his second term, Obama is trying to get Congress to act on two politically contentious issues: rewriting immigration law and setting stricter controls on firearms. Monday’s trip was his second outside Washingtonseeking to build public support and generate voter pressure on lawmakers; last week he traveled to Las Vegas where he focused on immigration.
Through a mix of 23 executive actions and additional legislative proposals, Obamais seeking the most ambitious action on gun control in decades. The effort follows a mass shooting at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school that drew the nation’s attention.
The president is asking Congress for background checks on all gun buyers, a ban on high-capacity ammunition clips and the reinstatement of a ban on sales of military-style assault weapons.
“Weapons of war have no place on our streets,” Obama said. His calls for tighter firearms restrictions have met with resistance from the gun lobby and lawmakers from both parties.
Wayne LaPierre, chief executive officer of the National Rifle Association, has called the administration’s drive the first step toward a national firearms registry and the further shrinking of gun owers’ rights.
“If you limit the American public’s access to semi-automatic technology, you limit their ability to survive,” he said Sunday on the Fox NewsSunday program.
LaPierre called universal background checks a “fraud.”
“It’s never going to be universal,” he said. “The criminals aren’t going to comply with it.”
LaPierre’s stance has been a turnaround from statements he made more than a decade ago, when he said he supported instant background checks for people buying guns at gun shows.
“We think it’s reasonable to provide mandatory instant criminal background checks for every sale at every gun show,” Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the National Rifle Association, said in 1999 after the Columbine High School shooting in suburban Denver. “No loopholes anywhere for anyone.”
But now, LaPierre says gun laws requiring background checks are ineffective at keeping guns out of the hands ofcriminals.
“I do not believe the way the law is working now, unfortunately, that it does any good to extend the law to private sales between hobbyists and collectors,” LaPierre told the Senate Judiciary Committee last month.
Minnesota is the home state of B. Todd Jones, whom Obama has nominated to become head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The ATF has been without a director for six years. Jones is currently the U.S. attorney in Minnesota and acting director of the bureau.
Minneapolis last month hosted a five-state regional gun summit. Mayor R.T. Rybak has called on Congress to expand the ability of local and federal law enforcement officers to share information about guns used in crimes and confirm a permanent director of the ATF.
Rybak also is among a coalition of mayors backing Obama’s calls for universal background checks on gun sales and banning assault weapons and highcapacity magazines.
As the president traveled to Minneapolis, the White House fielded more questions about Obama’s experience with sport shooting.
The White House on Saturday released a photo of the president skeet shooting at Camp David last Aug. 4, for his birthday. After Obama said in an interview with the New Republic magazine that he and guests at the presidential retreat in rural Maryland shoot “all the time,” some critics expressed skepticism.
White House press secretary Jay Carney said that “therewere persistent questions” about the president’s shooting that while “it should have been apparent” that he had done it when he said he did, “we released a photo to demonstrate that.”
Carney also said that Obama has shot firearms on multiple occasions and at locations other than Camp David, without releasing any additional details.
Meanwhile, the nation’s schools chief says more needs to be done to make sure children live long enough to attend college. He is joining more than 350 university presidents in urging Congress to take action to protect students from gun violence.
Education Secretary Arne Duncan told reporters Monday that guns have no place in schools or on college campuses, other than in the hands of law enforcement. Standing with members of College Presidents for Gun Safety, Duncan also said pressure from outside Washington is needed to force Congress to act on proposals to reduce gun violence.
Information for this article was contributed by Margaret Talev, Lisa Lerer and Heidi Przybyla of Bloomberg News and by Alicia A. Caldwell and staff members of The Associated Press.
Front Section, Pages 2 on 02/05/2013