President Donald Trump will not push for raising the federal minimum age to purchase a long gun to 21, administration officials announced Sunday.
Trump will however continue to advocate for federal funding and support for arming and training voluntary teachers. The president is set to form a special commission on school safety headed by his secretary of education Betsy DeVos which still could recommend raising the minimum age for guns. The policy initiatives come in the wake of a February school massacre in Parkland, Florida.
“No student, no family, no teacher and no school should have to live the horror of Parkland or Sandy Hook or Columbine again,” Devos said to reporters.
The White House will also push for states to strengthen their laws allowing them to place risk protection orders on the mentally ill to mitigate their access to a firearm. Legislatively the president will continue to back the Fix NICS act which strengthens the federal background check system and the STOP school violence act which provides additional funding to the Department of Justice.
Trump has previously broken with the National Rifle Association by publicly advocating for raising the federal minimum age to 21, though appears to have backed down from his pledge.
I will be strongly pushing Comprehensive Background Checks with an emphasis on Mental Health. Raise age to 21 and end sale of Bump Stocks! Congress is in a mood to finally do something on this issue – I hope!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 22, 2018