President Trump said Thursday that the National Rifle Association and Congress share his sense of urgency to prevent school shootings, including raising the age limit on some gun purchases.
“There’s a tremendous feeling that we want to get something done … including at the NRA,” Mr. Trump said during a White House meeting with state and federal law-enforcement officials.
The president said he favors raising the age limit for purchasing long guns from 18 to 21 among other “common sense” proposals, and he asserted that the NRA “will back it.”
“The NRA is ready to do things. People like to blame them,” the president said. “I really think the NRA wants to do what’s right. I’ve spoken to them often in the last two days.”
The NRA has said publicly it opposes further age restrictions on firearm purchases but agrees with Mr. Trump’s call to keep “dangerously mentally ill” people from acquiring firearms.
NRA Public Affairs Director Jennifer Baker said in a statement Wednesday night, “Federal Law prohibits adults under the age of 21 from purchasing a handgun from a licensed firearm dealer. Legislative proposals that prevent law-abiding adults aged 18-20 years old from acquiring rifles and shotguns effectively prohibits them for purchasing any firearm, thus depriving them of their constitutional right to self-protection.”
Mr. Trump insisted that part of the solution to school shootings must be allowing qualified adults, whether teachers or other school officials, to carry guns in school to confront gunmen before police arrive.
“We need offensive as well as defensive,” he said. “If we don’t have offensive measures within these schools, you’re just kidding yourselves, folks. I hear so many of these wonderful plans where you’re going to live in this utopian school and there’s not going to be any protection, there’s not going to be any guns, there’s not going to be any bullets flying at the perpetrator, the animal that wants to destroy the lives of families and children. Unless you’re going to have offensive capability, you’re wasting your time.”
He said school shootings will continue unless adults in schools are armed.
“I want to end the problem,” Mr. Trump said. “Unless we’re going to have an offensive capability, it’s going to happen again and again and again. It’s going to be the same old story, and people are going to be sitting around tables and talking.”
With armed adults in schools, he said, “All of a sudden, this horrible plague will stop.”
Colorado Republican State Rep. Patrick Neville advocated allowing “good people [to] defend our students.”
“I happen to agree with you,” Mr. Trump said. “We have to harden our schools, not soften them up.”
The president added, “I want certain highly adept people, people who understand weaponry, guns” to carry guns with a “conceal carry” permit. He even suggested a bonus for trained teachers who are armed.
“You can’t hire enough security guards,” Mr. Trump said. “But you could have concealed [firearms] on the teachers. I want my schools protected just like I want my banks protected.”
Mr. Trump told Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi that he’s also concerned about children’s exposure to violence in video games, movies and on the internet.
“We have to do something about maybe what they’re seeing and how they’re seeing it,” he said. “We may have to talk about that also.”
Mr. Trump said he’s called many lawmakers who are more receptive to action on guns since last week’s shooting at a Florida high school in which 17 people were killed.
“They’re into doing background checks that maybe they wouldn’t be thinking about” a few weeks ago,” he said.
The president signaled support this week for a bill that would spur greater compliance with a federal database that tracks individuals’ criminal records, in part to prevent them from purchasing firearms.
Officials have said the Florida gunman, 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz, suffers from behavioral problems that were not addressed adequately.
“We want to ensure that when we see warning signs we act quickly,” the president said. “This guy was a sicko.”
Mr. Trump is also moving to ban “bump stocks,” accessories that enable the shooter of a semiautomatic rifle to fire the weapon more rapidly. Cruz wasn’t using a bump stock, but the gunman who killed 59 last fall at a music festival in Las Vegas used at least two of the devices.
When Florida Education Commissioner Pam Stewart mentioned active-shooter drills at schools, the president interrupted her.
“Active-shooter drills is a very negative thing,” Mr. Trump said. “I don’t like it. I’d much rather have a hardened school… I think it’s crazy. I think it’s very hard on children.”
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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