President Biden responded to Monday’s fatal school shootings in Nashville, Tennessee, during a stop in North Carolina on Tuesday, omitting some nuance about the Second Amendment in the wake of tragedy.
The president made a scheduled stop in Durham, North Carolina, to speak about his economic agenda and the advancement of semiconductors.
But before he got to the meat of his speech Tuesday, the president addressed the tragedy that occurred at a private Christian school in Nashville, the Covenant School, on Monday.
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Six victims were shot and killed when 28-year-old Audrey Elizabeth Hale, whom police identified as a transgender former student of the school, entered the building with two “assault-type rifles” and a handgun before opening fire.
After Hale killed three 9-year-old students and three adults, Metropolitan Nashville Police officers killed Hale at the scene.
Biden told the crowd in Durham on Tuesday that Monday’s incident was the families’ “worst nightmare.”
Biden said he lost a child to an accident and another to cancer, noting that there was nothing like losing a child, especially when taken in a senseless and heartbreaking act.
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“They should be with us … as a nation, we owe these families more than our prayers. We owe them action,” the president said. “You know, we have to do more to stop this gun violence that is ripping communities apart, ripping apart the soul of this nation. Protect our children so they learn how to read and write instead of duck and covering in a classroom.”
The president, who describes himself as a “Second Amendment guy,” said the weapons used on Monday were “weapons of war” and that the right to bear arms is not absolute.
“You’re not allowed to go out and own an automatic weapon. You’re not allowed to own a machine gun. You’re not allowed to own a flamethrower,” Biden said. “You’re not allowed to own so many other things. Why in God’s name do we allow these weapons of war on our streets and in our public schools?”
While the National Firearms Act imposes strict limits on machine guns, it allows for exceptions, though minimal.
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In addition, the law does not specifically ban flamethrowers. A 2019 House bill that aimed to subject flamethrowers to the same federal regulation never passed.
Biden has previously said that the Second Amendment also banned the ownership of cannons when it was passed in 1791, but that, too, has been debunked.
He continued making claims about firearms, especially when it comes to the death of children.
“This is hard to believe,” he said. “I never thought when I started my public life that guns would be the No. 1 killer of children in America. Guns. No. 1. It’s sick and overwhelming; a majority of gun owners agree we have to do something.”
Analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation published in 2022 did find that firearms recently became the number-one cause of death for children in the U.S., surpassing deaths related to motor vehicles or other injuries.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This report has been updated to clarify firearms limits and the prevalence of gun-related deaths among U.S. children.