Package of concrete proposals' on guns coming Wednesday from WH
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by Frank Thorp and Kristin Welker, NBC News
"Tomorrow, the president and the vice president will hold an event here at the White House to unveil a package of concrete proposals to reduce gun violence and prevent future tragedies like the one in Newtown, Connecticut," White House spokesman Jay Carney said during a briefing Tuesday afternoon.
President Obama and Vice President Biden will announce a package of gun control proposals in response to the Connecticut school massacre, says White House spokesman Jay Carney.
Carney said that the president will be joined at the 11:45 a.m. event by children from around the country who wrote the White House with concerns about gun violence in the wake of the Newtown school shootings that left 20 children dead. He added that the president has previously backed a "comprehensive approach" including an assault weapons ban and a measure to ban high-capacity clips, but he stressed that both items will require congressional action. "The president will take a comprehensive approach, but it is a simple fact that there are limits on what can be done within existing law and Congress has to act on the kinds of measures that we've already mentioned, because the power to do that is reserved by Congress," Carney said of the need for "significant" action on gun control measures. The president met with Vice President Joe Biden Monday - a day ahead of schedule - to discuss the Biden-led task force's recommendations after the group's series of meetings with stakeholders in the gun violence debate. Congressional officials familiar with the task force meetings said late Monday that Biden and his staff have developed 19 areas where Obama could use executive orders to institute new gun control policy. 
Brendan Smialowski / AFP - Getty Images
President Barack Obama speaks during a press conference in the East Room of the White House on January 14, 2013 in Washington.
Recommended: With House set to OK Sandy spending, efforts continue to add unrelated funds The measures potentially implemented by executive action would be different than legislation regarding a possible assault weapons ban or a large magazine ban that may be introduced in Congress, officials said. Conservatives have raised strong objections to the idea of any executive actions on the part of the White House, saying that the president's efforts constitute a violation of the Second Amendment. Freshman Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Texas, has even threatened to introduce articles of impeachment. "Any proposal to abuse executive power and infringe upon gun rights must be repelled with the stiffest legislative force possible," he said in a statement. "Under no circumstances whatsoever may the government take any action that disarms any peaceable person — much less without due process through an executive declaration without a vote of Congress or a ruling of a court." But Democrats have pushed back at the notion that any executive action would affect gun ownership or rights, saying that unilateral action from the White House will merely reinforce current laws rather than creating new ones. "There are many (options), but they all are directing federal agencies to increase or to activate more aggressively on items that already exist in the law," Rep Chaka Fattah, D-Penn., told NBC News. "The notion that he's circumventing Congress is not accurate at all." Fattah was not at the meeting with Biden, but he said his staff was in attendance. NBC's Carrie Dann contributed to this report.  |
