President Biden Wants Democrats and Republicans to Work Together on Common-Sense Gun Laws

Illustration of a gun shop. (Wikimedia Commons/Missmen)

JAKARTA - United States President Joe Biden wants Democrats and Republicans to work together to produce sensible gun laws, after another school shooting occurred in the country on Wednesday local time.

Concerned and saddened by the incident, President Biden said in a statement issued by the White House that ending the epidemic of gun violence is very important to him.

"That's why I signed the Bipartisan Safe Communities Act and have announced dozens of executive actions on gun safety. I also established the first Office of Gun Violence Prevention in the White House, overseen by Vice President Harris. We have made significant progress, but this crisis requires much more," President Biden said in a statement uploaded by the White House, as quoted on September 5.

In the statement, President Biden also asked that Democrats and Republicans work together to produce meaningful legislation.

"After decades of inaction, Republicans in Congress must finally say 'enough is enough' and work with Democrats to pass sensible gun safety legislation," he said.

"We must ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines once again, require safe storage of firearms, enact universal background checks, and end impunity for gun manufacturers. These steps will not bring back those who tragically died today, but they will help prevent more tragic gun violence from tearing apart more families," he said.

After decades of inaction, Republicans in Congress must finally say ‘enough is enough’ and work with me to pass common-sense gun safety legislation.

These measures won't bring back those who we've lost, but it will help prevent gun violence from ripping more families apart.

— President Biden (@POTUS) September 4, 2024

Two teachers and two students were killed in a shooting by a 14-year-old student at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, United States on Wednesday. The shooting also injured nine other people, quoted by Reuters.

The suspect, identified as Colt Gray, 14, who was a student at the school, was taken into custody and will be charged and tried as an adult, said Chris Hosey, director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

The suspect spoke with investigators, but they declined to say whether they knew what motivated him. They also did not say what type of weapon was used in the shooting.

"What we saw behind us today is an evil thing," Sheriff Jud Smith said at a brief news conference on the school grounds.

Smith said his deputies quickly responded to the shooting after the sheriff's office was alerted to an active shooter at about 10:20 a.m. local time.

The armed student was confronted by a deputy at the school and the boy immediately dropped to the ground and surrendered, Smith said, saying the suspect was armed with an "AR platform weapon," or semi-automatic rifle.

The suspect, who had been interviewed by law enforcement last year over online threats about a school shooting, was taken into custody shortly after the shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, investigators said.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) later issued a statement saying it had been investigating online threats to carry out a school shooting in 2023, with local law enforcement interviewing a 13-year-old subject and his father in nearby Jackson County. The statement did not identify the teenager, but Georgia officials said the statement was related to the person taken into custody.

"The father stated that he had hunting guns in the home, but the individual did not have unsupervised access to the guns. The individual denied making threats online. Jackson County notified local schools to continue monitoring the individual," the FBI said, adding that there was no sufficient probable cause to make an arrest at the time.