Trump to veto gun reform bill closing loophole that led to Charleston church massacre

White House is forced to retreat on the president’s support for strengthening federal background checks

Donald Trump will veto a pair of gun reform bills seeking to enhance nationwide background checks if they pass the US Senate, the White House has announced, citing “burdensome requirements on certain firearm transactions”.

The president has previously stated his support for strengthening federal background checks on gun sales while discussing the bipartisan measure with Senator John Cornyn at his Florida golf club last year, one week after a gunman killed 17 people inside Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school in Parkland, which is located just 64 km (40 miles) away from Mr Trump’s exclusive property.

His administration reversed that stance in a statement on Monday, however, as it appeared HR 8 and HR 1112 – the two background check bills making their way through Congress – could pass through the US Senate with several Republicans possibly supporting either legislation.

The White House threatened a veto for HR 8, also called the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019, saying the measure would require “extensive regulation” and “is incompatible with the Second Amendment’s guarantee of an individual right to keep arms”.

The bill has been cosponsored by 232 lawmakers on either side of the political divide.

The White House said it opposed HR 1112, also called Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2019, claiming it would essentially allow the federal government “to restrict firearms purchases through bureaucratic delay”, a move it argued would also “undermine” the Second Amendment.

“If HR 8, or HR 1112, are presented to the president, his advisors would recommend he veto the bill,” the statement continued.

Both bills will easily pass through the US House of Representatives and are expected to receive a handful of votes from Republican senators, although it remains unclear whether either of them will eventually reach the president’s desk.

The bills would close the “Charleston loophole”, a flaw in current legislation that allowed Dylann Roof to purchase a gun, despite a past drug arrest.

Roof was allowed to buy the .45-calbre handgun because of mistakes by FBI agents and a failure by local prosecutors to respond to a bureau request for more information about his case. Roof was sentenced to death for killing nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.

The White House was forced to immediately retreat on Mr Trump’s apparent support of the bipartisan measure last year after it was revealed he had discussed it with Mr Cornyn in Florida.

“Revisions are being considered,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders stressed at the time, noting “the president is supportive of efforts to improve the federal background check system”.

Mr Trump vowed to take on the National Rifle Association (NRA), saying “they have less power over me” last year after the Parkland massacre. Federal gun laws have remained mostly intact throughout his presidency. It has been reported the NRA spent nearly $30m (£22.8m) to help elect Mr Trump in 2016.

The president moving away from his support of gun reform laws reflects a national trend in the US, in which public support for strengthening gun sales measures spikes after a mass shooting before receding in the months that follow.

Of those surveyed in a poll a year after the Parkland massacre, 51 per cent supported stricter gun laws, indicating a 20 per cent nationwide drop in the 12 months after one of the deadliest shootings in modern US history.