The White House cancelled the daily press briefing per Pres. Donald Trump's request, gathering lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to take immediate action on gun control in a non-partisan fashion. He expressed a desire to come out of the meeting with real solutions.
With a take charge attitude, said the president as he sat in the middle of democrats and republicans, "We can't wait and play games and not get things done. . . We don't wanna wait. . .We are determined to turn our grief into action."
Pushing back on his "friends" at the NRA (National Rifle Association), he went on to say, "I had lunch with them and said, 'it's time. We gotta stop this nonsense. It's time.'"
For the first 20 minutes of the meeting, the group zoned in on implementing universal background checks. One of the president's specific proposals to gun control is to raise the age to purchase semi-automatic guns from 18 to 21.
Trump later suggested the hindering the ability of mentally ill people from purchasing firearms should be a priority. He said, "Some people don't like me saying this, but. . .I don't want mentally ill people to be having guns."
Sen. Diane Feinstein(D) Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee expressed the urgent need to keep everyday citizens from having access to has a bill on the table to ban assault weapons such as the AR 15 that is intended to be used on the battlefield only.
Continuing along the same vein, Assistant Majority Leader Sen John Corryn (R) proposed to end Bump Stock rifles (i.e., a type of machine gun.) The president said the change is already in the works and he will ban Bump Stock devices without going through Congress.
In response to a comment about the meeting being a meaningless front, Pres. Trump said he will take full action in his role to ensure the conversations today are not placed on the back burner and condemned past presidents, both democrats and republicans for doing nothing about the issue.
Trump left the discussion saying the he felt it was "terrific."