US president Joe Biden has said he is “determined” to ban assault weapons in the United States.
In a forceful speech in Pennsylvania on Tuesday, he also strongly criticised allies of the former president Donald Trump for failing to condemn those who attacked police and law enforcement officers.
“It’s sickening to see the new attacks on the FBI, ” Mr Biden said.
The comment was an obvious reference to some congressional Republicans who have proposed “defunding” the FBI following the search of Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida for classified documents which had been taken from the White House.
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“I’m opposed to defunding the police,” the president said in a speech at Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, close to his hometown of Scranton. “I’m also opposed to defunding the FBI.”
Mr Biden criticised the political supporters of Mr Trump and his Make America Great Again (Maga) movement.
“Let me say this to my Maga republican friends in Congress: Don’t tell me you support law enforcement if you won’t condemn what happened on the 6th,” Mr Biden said, referring to the attack by Mr Trump’s supporters on the US Capitol building on January 6th last year in a bid to delay the certification of the 2020 presidential result. “For God’s sake, whose side are you on?”
Mr Biden, without naming him, attacked a recent comment made by Republican senator Lindsey Graham that there would be “riots in the streets” if Mr Trump was charged by federal prosecutors over taking classified documents to his home.
“The idea you turn on a television and see senior senators and congressmen saying, ‘If such-and-such happens, there will be blood in the street’? Where the hell are we?”
The president also indicated he believed more should be done to tackle gun violence in the United States and that the US congress should go further than the limited measures passed in the aftermath of the school shooting in Uvalde in Texas in May.
“We beat the National Rifle Association (NRA). We took them on and beat the NRA straight up. You have no idea how intimidating they are to elected officials,” he said,
“We’re not stopping here. I’m determined to ban assault weapons in this country. Determined. I did it once before. And I’ll do it again.”
As a senator, Mr Biden played a leading role in temporarily banning assault-style weapons. This legislation lapsed several years ago and the president wants it to be re-introduced. Republicans in the US congress are strongly opposed to such a move.
The speech on Tuesday continued Mr Biden’s recent more aggressive rhetoric against his Republican opponents in advance of crucial mid-term elections in November which will determine who will control the US Congress for the remaining two years of his presidency.
During a rally near Washington last week, Mr Biden likened Republican ideology to “semi-fascism.”
He is scheduled to deliver a big speech on democracy on Thursday which the White House has said “will make clear” who is fighting for democratic values.
