On Wednesday, President Biden made multiple false claims as he discussed the mass shooting at an elementary school in Texas that killed at least 19 children and 2 teachers while he attempted to use the tragedy to advance his political agenda.
“The Second Amendment is not absolute,” the president said. “When it was passed you couldn’t own a cannon, you couldn’t own certain weapons. There’s always been limitations.”
Biden has previously been criticized for his repeated claimed that cannons were prohibited when the Second Amendment was passed. In 2021 the claim earned him “Four Pinocchios” from the Washington Post and in 2020 it was labeled “False” by PolitiFact.
Additionally, there were no limitations on guns when the Second Amendment was passed. The first national gun law was not until the 1934 National Firearms Act, and that states were not bound by the Second Amendment until the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868.
Biden later doubled down on his call for reinstating the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons ban which had no effect on firearm homicide rates and a 2014 study found “murder rates were 19.3% higher when the Federal ban was in effect.” In fact, school shootings slightly increased after the ban was enacted.
Biden made the comments as he signed an executive order on policing on Wednesday, the anniversary of George Floyd’s death. The executive order will create national accreditation standards, a database for police officer misconduct, and incentives to ban chokeholds.
