This Friday the United States Congress approved a bipartisan compromise on the possession of weapons by the population. The new law, which prohibits people considered dangerous from accessing Firearmsputs an end to nearly three decades of legislative inaction on how to counter gun violence and toughen the country’s gun laws.
The president is expected Joe Biden enact it in the next few days.
The House approved the measure by 234 votes in favor and 193 against, in light of the fact that last month a teenager broke into an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, and with a semi-automatic rifle massacred 19 children and two teachers, which sparked outrage across the country.
“This bipartisan legislation will help protect Americans,” President Biden said in a statement. “Children in schools and communities will be safer now because of this.”
Galvanized by the horror of the recent shooting in Texas, as well as the May racist attack on a Buffalo supermarket that killed 10 people, lawmakers reached a deal that nonetheless fell far short of sweeping gun control that Democrats have long demanded.
The legislation improves background checks for potential gun buyers under the age of 21, requiring for the first time that authorities have time to examine juvenile records, including mental health records for people 16 and older.
The law also provides millions of dollars for states to implement so-called red flag laws that allow officials to temporarily seize guns from people deemed too dangerous in court to possess, and other intervention programs. And, as expected, it strengthens the laws against false sales and arms trafficking.
Additionally, the measure spends more federal money to bolster mental health programs across the country and bolster school safety. And the bill tightens the federal ban on domestic abusers buying firearms, including recent or current dating partners, to close what has been called the boyfriend loophole.
Final passage of the measure came a day after 15 Republican senators joined Democrats in breaking up a filibuster Republican deal to push the measure through the Senate. That removed a hurdle that had proven insurmountable to most previous efforts to update gun laws after other horrific mass shootings.
“Today they are after our Second Amendment freedoms, and who knows what tomorrow will be,” Congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee and a staunch opponent of the law, said of the Democrats.
Final approval of the measure came after The Supreme Court struck down a New York State law that restricted the places people could take a firearm outside the home, a decision that floored some Democrats who were elated by the success of the gun bill after decades of congressional failure on the issue.
