On the tenth anniversary of the country’s worst-ever school shooting, at Sandy Hook Elementary, President Joe Biden said on Wednesday that the country should feel collective “guilt” for failing to address gun violence.
“We have a moral obligation to pass and enforce laws that can prevent these things from happening again,” Biden said in a statement.
“I am determined to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines like those used at Sandy Hook,” he said.
In a five-minute shooting spree, a young man named Adam Lanza, armed with an AR-15 military-style assault rifle, killed 20 children and six adults in Newtown, Connecticut. Lanza later committed suicide.
The shooting shocked America and the world, prompting increased school security and reigniting a contentious debate over gun control laws that has lasted a decade.
Following the shooting deaths of 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, in May 2022, Congress passed legislation expanding background checks and reinforcing measures to keep firearms out of the hands of potentially dangerous people.
However, a stricter law prohibiting the use of assault rifles expired in 2004, and Congress has repeatedly failed to renew it, even as the country suffers mass shooting after mass shooting. This inertia is largely due to Republican opposition, which cites the constitutional right to bear arms.
