Trump considers gun background checks

WASHINGTON — In the wake of two mass shootings, the divisive politics of gun control appeared to be in flux Thursday as President Donald Trump explored whether to back expanded background checks on gun purchasers and Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican majority leader, signaled that he would at least be open to considering the idea.

It is not clear that either the president or McConnell will embrace such legislation, which both have opposed in the past and which would have to overcome opposition from the National Rifle Association and other powerful conservative constituencies.

But their willingness to weigh its political appeal and feasibility — or to be seen doing so — suggested that Republicans are feeling pressure to take some substantive action after mass shootings over the weekend in El Paso and Dayton, Ohio, that killed 31 people. McConnell said that a measure expanding background checks to all gun purchasers would be “front and center” when the Senate comes back into session next month.

“There is a lot of support for that,” he said in an interview with a Kentucky radio host, adding that the discussion would also encompass so-called red flag legislation that would make it easier to seize firearms from people deemed dangerous. Such legislation had already been gathering support from Republicans.

While stopping short of backing abackground check measure or committing to bring it to a vote, McConnell said, “I think the urgency of this is not lost on any of us because we’ve seen too many of these horrendous acts.”

If Trump were to back such legislation and McConnell proved willing to bring it up in the Senate, it would signal a fundamental change in the gun control debate. After previous mass shootings, similar discussion about Trump and congressional Republicans dropping their opposition to expanded background checks went nowhere.

McConnell’s comments came as Trump has been reaching out to awide array of allies and opponents — including, on Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader — to gauge the possibilities of pushing through a background check bill. The president spoke with McConnell on Thursday morning and has held a series of discussions with Sen. Patrick Toomey, R-Pa., who has been pushing a bipartisan background check bill.

He has directed White House aides to determine what he might be able to do through executive action if Congress does not act. And he has reached out to Wayne LaPierre, the embattled head of the NRA, seeking to test whether the organization’s formidable clout in blocking gun control legislation is ebbing.

“I certainly think it’s fair to say the president is very interested; the president would like to do something in the background check space,” Toomey said, though he added that Trump has not committed to supporting his bill, which fell to a filibuster in 2013.

In a statement, Pelosi and Schumer said they had told the president that McConnell should take up a background check bill passed by the House this year.

Still, Democrats caution that they have been down this road with Trump and McConnell before, and it is not clear how sustained Trump’s attention to the issue will be or how much political capital he will spend to follow through.

After the massacre of 58 people at a Las Vegas concert in 2017 and the killing of 17 students in Parkland, Fla., the next year, Trump made good on a pledge to impose a ban on bump stocks, the attachments that enable semi-automatic rifles to fire in sustained, rapid bursts. But he also expressed support for taking guns away from dangerous or mentally ill people — even without court orders — only to back away after gun-rights advocates fiercely objected.

Part of the challenge for lawmakers seeking action is that the White House is divided — as is often the case. The hard-liners and Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., who is close to pro-gun activists, are uneasy about angering the president’s heavily white and rural base by pursuing gun control measures before 2020.

But others, particularly Trump’s eldest daughter and senior adviser, Ivanka Trump, are aggressively lobbying the president to take action, according to Republican officials who have been in touch with her.

A close adviser to McConnell, Scott Jennings, said Thursday that he spoke with the leader earlier this week and encouraged him to pursue a background check bill.

“I think we’ve reached a tipping point,” said Jennings, who is based in Kentucky and has advised McConnell for years. “The polling clearly supports that notion, and as long as the president is going to be for something, Ithink there will be momentum for it within the party.”