总统乔·拜登周一在白宫南草坪接待数百名受枪支暴力影响的人，以宣传第一大事件时，被一名儿子在大规模校园枪击事件中丧生的家长短暂打断两党枪支立法在近30年内通过国会。
在他发言之前，曾治疗罗布小学大规模枪击事件受害者的乌瓦尔迪儿科医生罗伊·格雷罗博士和水牛城大屠杀最年长受害者露丝·怀特菲尔德的儿子小加内尔·怀特菲尔德首先简短介绍了拜登和副总统卡玛拉·哈里斯。
“晒干的白玫瑰和晒干的泰迪熊都被拿走存放了。格雷罗说:“我们内心深处仍有一种空虚感。
“在一个孩子不想回到学校的社区里做一名儿科医生是很艰难的，父母也不想因为害怕未来的袭击而把他们送到那里，”他补充道。“我花了半天时间让孩子们相信没有人会来救他们，他们知道自己是安全的，但我怎么能说知道袭击中使用的武器仍然可以自由获得呢?让这仅仅是禁止攻击性武器运动的开始。”
怀特菲尔德宣读了水牛城枪击案受害者的名字，这起枪击案夺去了他86岁母亲的生命。他赞扬拜登和哈里斯为减少枪支暴力所做的工作，并说:“我们知道这只是第一步。”
拜登上个月签署了两党更安全社区法案，使之成为法律，但这一签署被蒙上了阴影，因为它是在最高法院宣布推翻罗伊诉韦德案的决定后一天签署的。周一为总统提供了一个新的机会来庆祝胜利——但一周前，伊利诺伊州高地公园的7月4日游行发生了另一起大规模枪击事件，造成7人死亡，数十人受伤。
大约在高地公园枪击案发生的一周前，拜登走上南草坪的讲台，在他的翻领上佩戴了一条丝带，以纪念枪支暴力的受害者。
在拜登开始讲话后不久，曼纽尔·奥利弗(Manuel Oliver)打断了拜登的讲话，这显然是一种抗议。奥利弗17岁的儿子华金(Joaquin)在帕克兰大规模枪击事件中丧生。奥利弗公开批评了这项立法。
“我们必须做得更多!”奥利弗喊道。“多年来我一直想告诉你这件事!”
拜登说，“让他说，”然后继续他准备好的讲话，奥利弗被一名工作人员护送离开。
后来，奥利弗对记者说，他为自己打断拜登的决定进行了辩护——他反对白宫将这一两党成就变成一场“庆祝”——并指出乌瓦尔迪社区仍在哀悼19名儿童和两名教师遇难。
“庆祝这个词用错了。这周我们被邀请去乌瓦尔迪。乌瓦尔迪的母亲们仍在哭泣，”他说。“与此同时，我们，以某种方式，来到这里，鼓掌和起立鼓掌，这些类型的法案，顺便说一句，我欢迎，因为它将拯救一些生命，当我们这样做的时候，其他人只是被枪杀。我们不能接受这一点。”
拜登提到了起草这项立法的两党参议院谈判的领导人，包括参议员Kyrsten Sinema，Chrisy Murphy和Thom Tillis，并开玩笑说，他希望他不要让得克萨斯州的共和党人约翰·科宁也因为称赞他而“陷入困境”。拜登和科宁在他讲话后握手。
拜登总统表示，他所呼吁的行动都没有侵犯第二修正案的权利，甚至重申了他对第二修正案的支持，但当枪支成为“美国儿童的头号杀手”时，“我们不能只是袖手旁观”
“枪支是美国儿童的头号杀手...在过去的二十年里，更多的高中学生死于枪击，现役军人中的执勤警察也死于枪击。“我们不能再让它发生了。”
“伴随权利而来的是责任。是的，有携带武器的权利。但我们也有权自由生活，不用担心我们的生活，在杂货店，在教室，在操场，在教堂，在商店，在工作场所，在夜总会，在节日，在我们的社区，在我们的街道上，”他补充说。"携带武器的权利并不是支配所有其他权利的绝对权利."
枪支暴力幸存者和最近在得克萨斯州乌瓦尔迪和纽约州布法罗发生的大规模枪击事件受害者的家庭成员，以及科伦拜恩、桑迪胡克和帕克兰等大规模枪击事件的幸存者和家庭成员出席了会议。但是一些枪支安全倡导者哀叹这还不够。
据英国《金融时报》报道，私人团体“枪毙美国”的负责人伊戈尔·沃尔斯基说:“这里没有什么值得庆祝的。”美联社。“这是历史性的，但也是国会应该做的最起码的事情。”
在周一的活动之前，拜登问美国人在一条推文中给他发短信，讲述枪支暴力如何影响了他们的社区，试图兜售新法律将如何帮助阻止类似的暴力事件。
两党的《更安全社区法案》包括130亿美元的新支出，用于心理健康项目和保障学校安全。它还对21岁以下的枪支购买者进行了更严格的背景调查，有助于填补所谓的男友漏洞，以限制家庭暴力罪犯购买枪支，并激励红旗法律从被认为对自己或他人构成危险的人那里收缴枪支。
但它没有像包括拜登在内的许多人所希望的那样，缺乏普遍背景调查和禁止攻击性武器和大容量杂志等措施。
随着总统周一在枪支改革上取得进展，他也呼吁国会采取进一步行动。
他呼吁立法禁止攻击性武器和大容量弹匣，加强背景调查，并制定安全储存法。
“我们生活在一个充斥着战争武器的国家。设计用来打猎的武器没有被使用;他们购买的武器被设计成战争武器，用来消灭敌人，”他说。"在战区外使用这些武器的理由是什么?"
总统要求国会采取更多行动之际，参议院于周一结束了7月4日的休会。值得注意的是，参议院多数党领袖查克·舒默没有出席拜登的活动，因为他被新冠肺炎孤立了。
Biden interrupted by parent of mass shooting victim while marking gun law passage
President Joe Biden was briefly interrupted by a parent whose son was killed in a mass school shooting as he hosted hundreds impacted by gun violence on the White House South Lawn Monday to tout the first major bipartisan gun legislation to pass through Congress in nearly 30 years.
Before he spoke, Dr. Roy Guerrero, a Uvalde pediatrician who treated the victims of the Robb Elementary School mass shooting, and Garnell Whitfield, Jr., son of the oldest Buffalo massacre victim Ruth Whitfield, first offered brief remarks to introduce Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
"The dried white roses and the sun-bleached teddy bears have been taken away and stored. What remains is a hollow feeling in our gut," Guerrero said.
"It's been tough being a pediatrician in a community where children do not want to return to school, and parents don't want to send them there with the fear of a future attack," he added. "I spend half my days convincing kids that no one is coming for them and that they are safe knowing that they're safe -- but how do I say that knowing that the very weapons used in the attack are still freely available? Let this only be the start of the movement towards the banning of assault weapons."
MORE: Could that new federal gun safety law have prevented the July 4 parade shooting?
Whitfield read the names of the victims in the Buffalo shooting, which took the life of his 86-year-old mother, and while he praised Biden and Harris for their work to mitigate gun violence said, "We know that this is only the first step."
Biden signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act into law last month, but the signing was overshadowed since it came one day after the Supreme Court released its decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Monday provided the president a new opportunity to take a victory lap -- but it also came one week after another mass shooting at a July Fourth parade in Highland Park, Illinois, left seven dead and dozens wounded.
About one week to the hour of the Highland Park shooting, Biden took the podium on the South Lawn, wearing a ribbon on his lapel to honor gun violence victims.
Not long after he started speaking, Manuel Oliver, whose 17-year-old son Joaquin was killed in the Parkland mass shooting, interrupted Biden's remarks in an apparent protest. Oliver has publicly criticized the legislation.
"We have to do more than that!" Oliver shouted. "I've been trying to tell you this for years!"
Biden said, "Let him talk," before continuing with his prepared remarks as Oliver was escorted away by a staffer.
Later, speaking to reporters, Oliver defended his decision to interrupt Biden -- taking issue with the White House making this bipartisan achievement into a "celebration" -- and pointing to the community of Uvalde still mourning the loss of the 19 children and two teachers who were killed.
"The word celebration has been used in the wrong way. We were invited to Uvalde this week. Mothers are still crying in Uvalde," he said. "And meanwhile, we, some way, by being here, clapping and standing ovation, these types of bills, which by the way I welcome, because it will save some lives, while we do that, other people are just getting shot. We cannot accept that."
Biden named the leaders of the bipartisan Senate negotiations which crafted the legislation, including Sens. Kyrsten Sinema, Chrisy Murphy, and Thom Tillis, and joked that he hoped he doesn't get Republican John Cornyn of Texas "in trouble" for praising him, too. Biden and Cornyn shook hands after his remarks.
President Biden said none of the actions he's calling for infringe on Second Amendment rights, even repeating his support for the Second Amendment, but that "we can't just stand by" when guns are the "number one killer of children in the United States."
"Guns are the number one killer of children in the United States of America ... And over the last two decades more high school children have died from gunshots and on-duty police officers on active duty military combined," Biden said. "We can't let it happen any longer."
"With rights come responsibilities. Yes, there's a right to bear arms. But we also have a right to live freely, without fear for our lives in a grocery store, in a classroom, in a playground, and a house of worship, in a store, at a workplace, a nightclub, a festival, in our neighborhoods, in our streets," he added. "The right to bear arms is not an absolute right that dominates all others."
Gun violence survivors and family members of victims of recent mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and Buffalo, New York, attended, as well as survivors and family members from the Columbine, Sandy Hook and Parkland mass shootings, among others. But some gun safety advocates lament that it doesn't go far enough.
"There's simply not much to celebrate here," said Igor Volsky, director of the private group Guns Down America, according to the Associated Press. "It's historic, but it's also the very bare minimum of what Congress should do."
Ahead of Monday's event, Biden asked Americans in a tweet to text him their stories of how gun violence has impacted their communities, looking to tout how the new law will help stop similar violence.
The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act includes $13 billion in new spending for mental health programs and for securing schools. It also makes background checks stricter for gun buyers under 21, helps to close the so-called boyfriend loophole to restrict domestic violence offenders from purchasing guns, and incentivizes red flag laws to remove firearms from people deemed to be a danger to themselves or others.
But it doesn't go as far as many wanted, including Biden, lacking measures such as universal background checks and a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
As the president marked progress on gun reform Monday, he also called on Congress to act further.
He called for legislation that would ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, strengthen background checks and enact safe storage laws.
"We're living in a country awash in weapons of war. Weapons that were designed to hunt are not being used; the weapons designed that they're purchasing are designed as weapons of war, to take out an enemy," he said. "What is the rationale for these weapons outside war zones?"
The president's ask for more congressional action comes as the Senate returns from its July Fourth recess Monday. Notably, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was not at Biden's event because he is isolated with COVID-19.
