Earnest: ‘The President Is Under No Illusions’ a Law Can Be Passed to Stop Shootings

ACOSTA: “And just lastly, getting back to guns. It sounds pretty clear that legislation really is just not going to go anywhere because of the political climate in Washington as it stands right now. But the president talked about using the bully pulpit for his remaining months in office. I would imagine that that opens up the possibility of summits, meeting with families, perhaps traveling to places where these mass shooting incidents have occurred. Are any of these possibilities for the President on his radar screen in the coming months? Or is it just when a shooting happens, he’s going to come out to the podium and talk about it?”

EARNEST: “Well, I certainly wouldn’t rule out any of the things that you’ve described. But the fact that whenever the President has something to say in public, that all of you are there to cover it and to make sure that your readers and viewers understand it is a pretty significant authority that’s vested in the presidency. And the president is going to use that authority to make clear that he believes Congress needs to take some common-sense steps to make gun violence less frequent in this country. The President is under no illusions that there’s a law that can be passed that would prevent every incident of gun violence, but there surely is something that Congress can do to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and others who shouldn’t have them. And that will have a corresponding impact on the frequency of these kinds of incidents. It certainly will have an impact on those shooting incidents that don’t get nearly as much attention. What happened in Oregon was a genuine tragedy, and has touched hundreds if not thousands of lives. But we see this kind of gun violence in communities all across the country every single day. And the thought that Congress can do something to at least partially address that without threatening and undermining the basic constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans is a profound disappointment to the president. And he’s not alone. There are millions of Americans -- Democrats and Republicans -- who are disappointed by congressional inaction in this regard.”