After the massacre at an elementary school in Newton, Barack Obama made a similar appeal, wiping away a tear.

On Thursday, Joe Biden called on the US Congress to find a way to restrict the sale of assault rifles and castigated, nearly ten days after the massacre of 19 children and two teachers in a school in Texas, the elected Republicans who s oppose it.

Uvalde.

Buffalo.

Columbine.

Sandy Hook.

Charleston.

Orlando.

Vegas.

Parkland... The families of the victims have a message: "DO SOMETHING".

Biden calls on Congress for common-sense reform without "vilifying" gun-owners, but he insists: the 2nd Amendment "is not absolute".

pic.twitter.com/09ZYdcGYaz

— Philippe Berry (@ptiberry) June 2, 2022


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“How much more carnage are we willing to accept?

“, scolded the American president, repeating, during this address to the nation from the White House, to have “enough” of these repeated shootings which mourn America, with firearms which are, since 2020, the leading cause of death among children under 19.

Behind his desk were 56 candles representing the victims of these massacres in all American states and territories.

After the shootings at Uvalde Elementary School, a supermarket in Buffalo and Wednesday's shooting at a hospital in Tulsa, he insisted that "too many everyday places (had) become places of killing, battlefields”.

No chance in the Senate

Joe Biden has called for a national ban on the sale of semi-automatic assault rifles, including AR-15s, as between 1994 and 2004. But, aware of the difficulty of passing such a measure in Congress, where it would take convincing 10 Republican senators, he nuanced: “We must at least raise the minimum legal age” to obtain such weapons, from 18 to 21 years old.

Even this lesser measure seems for the moment out of reach.

He also called for a ban on high-capacity magazines, the strengthening of criminal or psychological background checks on potential buyers and the vote on a text requiring individuals to keep their weapons locked up.

“Over the past 20 years, more schoolchildren have died from gunfire than the total number of police and soldiers who have died on duty,” he said.

“Think about it.

“The second amendment” of the American Constitution, which guarantees the right to possess a weapon, “is not absolute”, estimated the Democratic president.

“I support the action (…) of a small group of Republican and Democratic senators who are trying to find a way, but my God, the fact that the majority of Republicans in the Senate do not want any of these proposals to be would be debated or put to the vote, I find that inadmissible, ”he castigated.

“We cannot betray the American people again,” he continued during that 17-minute speech.

“It is time for the Senate to do something.

»

“Optimism” of a Republican senator

"Thank you, Mr. President," Senator Chris Murphy wrote on Twitter.

“We have to do something.

And we can, ”continued this Connecticut elected official who, forever marked by the Sandy Hook shooting (26 dead including 20 children in 2012), leads the discussion group between Republicans and Democrats.

The challenge for this group is to find measures that could obtain the approval of ten Republican senators, essential because of the qualified majority in the Senate.

But in a country where more than 30% of adults own at least one firearm, conservatives strongly oppose any measures that could violate the rights of “law-abiding citizens”.

Discussions in the Senate therefore revolve for the moment around limited proposals, such as background checks on arms buyers, which associations have been calling for for years.

Could the current negotiations in the Senate succeed where all the others, notably those launched under Barack Obama after the Sandy Hook massacre, have failed?

“There is a growing momentum for us to get something done,” Senator Chris Murphy said on Twitter earlier.

Republican Senator Pat Toomey also expressed his "optimism".

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