Trump Was ‘Shaken’ After 2019 El Paso Shooting, Asked: ‘What Are We Going to Do About Assault Rifles?’

Saul Loeb/AFP, Getty Images

Former President Donald Trump was reportedly “shaken” after a 2019 massacre at an El Paso Walmart, and asked a chief advisor,”What are we going to do about assault rifles?”

The New York Times noted the country’s 45th president was also disturbed by the 2018 shooting in Parkland, Florida, at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The massacre left 17 dead and another 17 injured.

Trump made news at the time by saying he was open to imposing some restrictions on firearms. He dropped the issue following a meeting with the NRA.

The Times reported:

Unbeknownst to the public, however, Mr. Trump again pushed inside the White House for significant new gun-control measures more than a year later, after a pair of gruesome shooting sprees that unfolded over 13 hours. Those discussions have not previously been reported.

On Aug. 3, 2019, a far-right gunman killed 23 people at a Walmart store in El Paso. Early the next morning, a man shot and killed nine people outside a bar in Dayton, Ohio. Both assailants used semiautomatic rifles.

At the White House the next day, Mr. Trump was so shaken by the weekend’s violence that he questioned aides about a specific potential solution and made clear he wanted to take action, according to three people present during the conversation.

According to sources who were then close to Trump, he questioned if there was anything that could be done about the legality of popular AR-15 rifles.

Trump asked former acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney: “What are we going to do about assault rifles?”

Mulvaney’s reported response: “Not a damn thing.”

According to the Times, Trump asked Mulvaney, “Why,” and was told ““Because… you would lose.”

Trump is scheduled to address an NRA convention in Houston Friday. Protestors have converged on the convention, which is being held three days after a school shooting in Uvalde, Texas that left 19 children and two adults dead.

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