Biden Calls for ‘Tougher Gun Laws’ Before GOP House Takes Over: ‘The Idea We’re Still Allowing Semi-Automatic Gun Purchases Is Sick’

During a news event in Nantucket, Massachusetts, on Thanksgiving, President Biden told reporters he would urge Congress to enact “tougher gun laws” before Republicans take control of the House of Representatives early in the new year New York Post reported.

The president railed against “assault weapons” and called the sale of semi-automatic weapons “simply sick”.

The Commander-in-Chief told reporters outside the Nantucket Fire Department: “The idea that we’re still allowing semi-automatic weapon purchases is sick. It’s just sick. It has no, no social value. Zero. No manufacturer.”

When asked by a reporter if it would be possible for Congress to pass the new legislation during the lame duck session, Biden said, “I’ll try. I’ll try to get rid of offensive weapons.”

Biden added that he was “sick and tired” of mass shootings and called for a renewed push for “much stricter gun laws.”

The president argued that red-flag laws “could save lives” but are not adequately enforced in states across the country. He added that his late son, Beau Biden, enforced red flag laws in Delaware when he served as attorney general and that the policy was successful.

“The idea that we don’t enforce red flags, period, based solely on knowledge, not because a parent or loved one says you should arrest that person now for their own sake is ridiculous,” Biden said.

The commander-in-chief’s latest call for restrictions follows three mass shootings this month that killed a total of 14 and wounded 20.

Following last weekend’s tragic shooting at an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs, in which a non-binary person killed five and injured 18, Biden released a expression which read: “We must enact an assault weapons ban to get weapons of war off America’s streets.”

Though Democrats hold a majority in the House of Representatives through January, an evenly divided Senate makes it unlikely that Biden’s sweeping gun control legislation will pass. It would take at least 10 Republican supporters to meet the 60 vote requirement to bypass a filibuster.

“I’ll do it whenever I — I have to make that assessment when I step in and start counting the votes,” Biden said Thursday.