State Senate President Martin Looney of New Haven and New Haven Mayor Toni Harp — who as a state senator helped lead Looney the legislative effort to respond to the Sandy Hook school massacre — “embraced” President Barack Obama’s gun control announcement Tuesday.
Citing that same massacre, Obama announced plans to expand the categories of gun dealers who must conduct background checks on buyers, add 230 government examiners and staffers to work on background checks, and seek to boost mental health services.
“From this urban setting, where guns and gun violence remain far too prevalent, I embrace President Obama’s initiative to curb gun violence as I should think most American mayors will,” Harp said in a statement released by her office.
“Through a comprehensive effort including more widespread use of background checks, an enhanced mental health reporting system and more accessible treatment options, and with cooperation from gun manufacturers in terms of gun safety technology, we can work together to safeguard city streets from the lawless proliferation of guns and gun violence. Thank you, President Obama!”
Looney issued the following statement: “It is imperative that we have a national strategy for closing dangerous loopholes in our gun laws. In the absence of Congressional action, we welcome President Obama’s executive action. In Connecticut, unlike Congress, we passed the strongest, most comprehensive laws in the nation, proving that Democrats and Republicans can come together in a bipartisan manner to protect our families. President Obama came to Connecticut to praise our laws as a national model, and today we applaud the president’s leadership on this issue.”
Although I believe Obama is the most incompetent President we have had in my long lifetime, also and that the gun-lovers are correct when they say that criminals will still be able to obtain guns via black markets under proposed extended registration requirements, I like the proposals he has now made
The government is handicapped by the ridiculous fact that so many gun sales are now legally exempt from registration .Elimination of those exemptions is a good move as I see it
So too are extra efforts to provide treatment for the mentally defective folk who are most likely to be involved with misuse of weapons, and with mass killings
Would very much prefer that Congress itself work out solutions of these problems, as a guy like Obama taking the position for himself of Dictator and acting on his own as both executive and legislative departments is very scary
Hope the Supremes exert their power against Obama, and that Congress finally perform its own duties , protecting all of us, not just bowing to the NRA