In a primetime speech to the nation from the White House on Thursday (June 2), President Joe Biden said that the second amendment "is not absolute".
Per The New York Post, during his 17-minute address, Biden, 79, said too many places in America had become "killing fields".
"I respect the culture and the tradition and the concerns of lawful gun owners," Biden said, before adding: "At the same time, the Second Amendment, like all other rights, is not absolute."
"We need to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines," the POTUS declared. "And if we can’t ban assault weapons then we should raise the age to purchase them from 18 to 21."
Watch Biden's speech below:Biden's remarks come in the wake of mass shootings in Buffalo, Uvalde, and Tulsa. Families of victims have called for gun legislation to be implemented.
Biden asked amid his address: "How much more carnage are we willing to accept?"
The president also called for high-capacity magazines to be prohibited, questioning: "Why in God’s name should an ordinary citizen [be] able to purchase an assault weapon that holds 300-round magazines that let mass shooters fire hundreds of bullets in a matter of minutes?"
"The damage is so devastating. In Uvalde, parents had to do DNA swabs to identify the remains of their children – nine and 10-year-old-children. Enough," he said.
Biden also proposed some suggestions that could potentially win Republican backing, including addressing the nation’s "mental health crisis."
"There’s a serious youth mental health crisis in this country we have to do something about," he said. "That’s why mental health is at the heart of my unity agenda that I laid out in the State of Union address."
But he also tore into the GOP, saying: "My God, the fact that the majority of the Senate Republicans don’t want any of these proposals even to be debated or come up for a vote, I find unconscionable."
"This time we have to take the time to do something," Biden said, calling out the Senate, where 10 Republican votes would be needed to pass legislation.
"You can’t fail the American people again," he exclaimed.
Biden also mentioned the damage mass shootings have caused in the last decade: "Over the last two decades, more school-age children have died from guns than on-duty police officers and active-duty military — combined,"
Aware of the criticism from gun-rights advocates, he insisted that his appeal isn't about "taking away anyone’s guns", or "vilifying gun owners".
"We should be treating responsible gun owners as an example of how every gun owner should behave," Biden affirmed. "This isn’t about taking away anyone’s rights, it’s about protecting children, it’s about protecting families."
As reported by BBC News, the Democratic-led Protecting Our Kids Act incorporates eight different gun control bills and contains many of the proposals the president spoke of in his speech.
The legislation may pass the House next week but is not expected to clear the Senate.
