This law project notably strengthens criminal and psychological background checks for arms buyers between the ages of 18 and 21.
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It is the most important law on the subject for 30 years, but it remains below what Joe Biden hoped for. The United States Congress finally passed a law to put in place new restrictions on the possession of firearms, Friday, June 24.
The text, supported by Democratic and Republican parliamentarians, strengthens criminal and psychological background checks for gun buyers aged 18 to 21. It also provides for better control of the illegal sale of weapons as well as the funding of programs devoted to mental health. Such an agreement between the two parties on this very divisive subject is very rare: among the Republicans elected to the House, fourteen overstepped the instructions of their leader Kevin McCarthy to vote in favor of the project.
The measures adopted, however, remain very far from what President Joe Biden wanted, such as the banning of assault rifles, implicated in recent tragedies such as the shooting in the elementary school of Uvalde (Texas), which left 21 victims including 19 children, and that of Buffalo (New York) where 10 people were killed. The text also comes the day after an important decision by the American Supreme Court, which reaffirmed for the first time the constitutional right to carry a weapon in self-defense outside the home. The possibilities of restricting the carrying of firearms in the future will therefore be all the more limited.